New Ninja Turtles Adventures
by Turtlewarrioroflegend
Summary: A simple rescue of a girl will lead the Turtles and their allies into a whole new series of adventures and begin to show them what the world can really be like. Eventually Raph/OC with Donnie/April, Mikey/Renet, Leo/OC and others in later chapters. Also interested in what others would like to see.
1. How it starts

Disclaimer: I do not own TMNT or anything associated with it except my character. All things are noted from the 2012 series unless noted otherwise.

Note: This starts after the last episode "The Deadly Venom".

Above the streets of New York City, if one was looking well enough, the outline of four figures jumping from rooftop to rooftop could be seen. If one looked really closely the outline of shells could be seen, but no one would have really believed that four turtles were roof jumping across the city.

"How's everyone holding up?" The blue masked turtle Leonardo, or Leo as his friends called him, called back as he ran slightly ahead of his brothers, his katana holders bumping up against the back of his shell. It had only been twenty four hours removed from all of them being poisoned by their mind controlled sister Karai.

"We're doing just fine, thanks." The red masked turtle Raphael, or Raph for short, replied a little snappishly. He of all the turtles was the one most likely to not admit it even if this simple exercise was killing him.

"Speak for yourself." Gasped the purple masked turtle Donatello, Donnie for short. Considering the fact he was by and large the brains of the group, he was the least fit of the team, at least relatively speaking since they were ninjas and trained appropriately.

"I should have brought my skateboard." The orange masked turtle Michelangelo, or Mikey, mused to himself, not so much because he was tired but because he wanted to have some fun rather than do the exercise.

Leonardo continued on, knowing somewhere their human friends April O'Neil and Casey Jones were conditioning themselves a bit as well after being poisoned. In fact he wouldn't be surprised if their red headed friend was now at their lair training with their sensei Splinter. Casey would then be there too, tagging along.

"Hey, stop for a minute." Donatello called out as he slowed down.

His three brothers slowed down as well and Raphael mock glared at him. "Getting tired already there brainiac?" He inquired with a smirk.

Donatello gave him a mock glare back as he answered, "No shell brains. I thought I heard a scream."

"I think you're hearing things dude." Mikey said idly as he placed his hands on the back of his head.

Leonardo took a deep breath and closed his eyes, trying to focus his hearing. At first all he could hear was the slight bickering of two of his younger brothers and was too about to dismiss Donnie's claim when he thought he heard the start of a scream and then the sound of flesh on flesh. "He's right." Leo proclaimed. "This way."

The three turtles exchanged glances for just a moment before following their blue masked leader as they jumped a couple rooftops and landed on a fire escape. By that point the scene was clear.

The four turtles could make out four guys, all of them well-muscled and seemed to be about the size of one of their foes Chris Bradford before being double mutated into his current form that Mikey had named Rahzar.

Even more disturbing was the girl on the ground of the alley. She seemed a couple of years older than April, her long blonde hair dishelved, some of it covering her face. That did nothing to hide the black mark over her eye socket and upper left cheek. She wore a tank top that was torn from the bottom halfway up, revealing her tan and trim stomach, the left strap torn, and a pair of torn blue jean shorts.

"What the hell is going on?" Raph growled with a glare at the guys.

"That's not right." Mikey commented.

The girl tried to move away, the street lamp casting light over her and revealing several bruises on her arms, as well as several cuts on her arms and her knees were scraped up. One of the guys lashed out and stamped his foot on her left side, causing her to gasp in pain.

Donnie thought he heard a cracking. "Leo..." He started.

"Let's teach them a lesson." Leonardo said, beating him to the punch. Then all four turtles leapt down.

One of the guys drew a knife and glared down at her. "Stupid little girl." He snapped. "I'm going to make you regret all of your running." He started toward her, "Going to carve my initials right on your…"

"You won't be doing anything to anybody." Raphael said as he landed in between him and the girl, lashing out his arm and catching the knife in between the middle and left point of his three pronged weapon, the sai, and disarming him as he flipped the guy onto his back.

"You guys are jerks." Mikey stated as he brought his nunchucks around and slapped one of them across the face with it.

Donatello withdrew his six foot staff and twirled it around a moment before using it to sweep another of the guy's legs out from under him.

Leonardo had only drawn one of his katana as he landed in front of the last guy and feinted a slash at him. The guy stepped back as the blue masked turtle anticipated and followed up with a kick to his gut. "You guys are just sick." He stated.

"Our boss wants the girl back." He snapped as he glared at Leonardo.

"In how many pieces?" Donnie questioned sarcastically as he dodged the attempted leg sweep his opponent tried to deliver.

Raphael's opponent swung a punch at him, but the turtle in the red mask stepped to the side, flipped the sai in his left hand around, and trapped his arm in between the prongs of his weapon before whirling around and tossing him.

Mikey noticed the maneuver and did a side flip out of the way as his older brother's 'missile' sailed right into the guy he had been facing. "Nice move bro." He said.

Raph hadn't noticed as he turned to the girl. "Are you alright…er, I mean how are you feeling?" He amended his question as he realized she clearly was not okay. He was actually now sure Donnie was wrong, not all of these bruises were recent.

She blinked up at him and for a moment Raphael expected her to freak out but instead she tried to take a breath and said in a small voice, "I feel…not so good…" She wanted to say something more but ended up coughing. Raphael was relieved that she at least did not cough up blood.

Leonardo's opponent tried to attack him and the blue masked turtle moved to the side and shot his knee into his opponent's stomach and then tripped him. "Not too bright." Leo noted.

"Tell me about it." Donnie agreed as his opponent stood only to receive a staff jab into his stomach and then across the small of his back.

Mikey went to stand next to Raph as the girl got up. He then gasped a bit. "Raph, I think she's bleeding." He stated as he looked where she was getting up from.

Raph wanted to make a smart response to his younger brother's obvious statement until glancing at her and realized where it was coming from. She had a small knife sticking out of her right side, it looked to be in between two of her ribs. "Leo, we got to go." He said.

Leo and Donnie both turned to see what Raph was talking about, then they knew. "We have to get her to a hospital." Donnie said and then remembering they're mutants who can't be seen lamely added, "Somehow."

"No time." Leo replied and looked at Raph. "We need to take her to the lair and hope Master Splinter can treat her."

Raph nodded and reached out for her. Rather she would have fought or not became a non-issue as she lost consciousness and started to fall forward. Luckily he caught the girl in his arms. "Let's go." He said.

"Good thing you caught her Raph." Donnie commented as they headed toward the nearest manhole, not five feet away. "Given the direction she was falling it would have likely driven that knife further into her side."

"I'm sure she'll be glad to know she missed that." Leo said idly as he lifted the manhole cover and allowed his brothers to go before him.

From another rooftop the large skeletal looking dog known as Chris Bradford, but more commonly called Rahzar growled a bit. "What was that about? Who do those guys belong to?" He asked.

A few feet from him stood the mechanical legged fish named Xever, more commonly called Fishface. "I don't know." He answered his sometime nemesis and partner in crime. "They aren't from my neck of the woods. They don't look like Purple Dragons, and I don't think they belong to Steranko either."

"We seem to have new players on the field." Rahzar observed. "We should report this in."

"Perhaps we should…" Fishface started but lost his train of thought at the moment when he saw that the four goons the turtles had seemingly taken out were already gone. "They're gone." He noted.

"How is that possible?" Rahzar wondered but of course Fishface didn't know either. "Even more intriguing. Now we need to tell the others." The two mutants turned and started toward foot headquarters.

April raised her right arm to block, used her left arm to unfurl one of her Tessens, a fan like weapon that was never the less sharp around the edges, and brought her left arm up in an uppercut motion as if she were using the weapon to cut an adversary in half and then back flipped into a fighting stance.

"Yanmea." Master Splinter called out to his latest pupil in a quiet but firm voice. He walked toward her and stood in front of her, his wooden cane lightly tapping against the floor. He limped slightly as he was still recovering from a large mace attack due to the mind controlled actions of Slash, one of their allies. "Well done." He complimented her.

"Thank you sensei." April replied as she bowed to him.

Splinter thought that soon she might just be ready to accompany his sons on missions but thought it best not to tell April that just yet. Not that it mattered to much as circumstances, sometimes of her own doing and sometimes not, often found her on the battlefield anyway. Instead he simply said, "That is all for today."

April nodded and headed out of the dojo area to see her human friend Casey Jones sitting on the couch munching on a slice of pizza and flipping through channels. "Nothing good on." He muttered to himself. The he looked in her direction. "Hey, Red. Done for the day?"

"Yep." April said as she sat down next to him. "Definitely almost a full blown kunoichi." She added to herself.

"Rad." Casey said. "Of course, there is something to be said for the epicness that is Casey Jones." He added, not one to be shown up if he could help it. April rolled her eyes good naturedly.

"I hope the guys get back here soon." April remarked as she laid her head on the back of the couch and looked at the ceiling. "After all we just went through we all deserve to relax a little." She shuddered just a little at the memory of the snakes in her bed that promptly poisoned her at the order of there on again/off again ally Karai.

"Ditto on that." Casey agreed. He had not told anyone that Karai had poisoned him by giving him a kiss on the lips. He wasn't even sure it meant anything, but then again how could he know. It was kind of confusing in his mind.

It was then they saw Leonardo and Donatello barrel over the turnstile entrance to their lair. As Donnie ran to his lab Leo glanced over at their two human friends. "We need the couch clear." He announced to them before heading into the dojo, presumably to find Splinter.

April and Casey exchanged glances as they got up, wondering which of the two remaining turtles had been hurt. The looked to the turnstile as Mikey came through, followed only moments later by Raph. In his arms he held a girl that April thought was only a little older than her, though she was beaten up and seemed malnourished. "What's going on?" She asked Raph.

Raph started toward the couch. "We found her being attacked by these guys. Said their boss wanted her back." He started to explain.

"The Purple Dragons? Hun?" Casey asked, eyes narrowing. He was not a fan of the Purple Dragons, to say the least. To say nothing of their new leader Hun. "They did this?"

Mikey shook his head. "No way, man. These dudes weren't packing tats." He was heading toward the kitchen. "They still sucked though, not on the hanging level of the ninja." He added.

"We stepped in to help, but when she stood we saw the knife in her side." Raphael said as he nodded slightly to said object, which was facing away from Raph's body for obvious reasons. "We had to bring her here." He set her gently on the couch.

Donnie came out with the first aid kit. "We got to get that knife out." He proclaimed and looked at Casey. "Jones, when I tell you to, pull the knife out." He then looked to April. In this rare instance there was no trace of the infatuation he felt for the red head present, the situation being to grim. "When he does that, I need you to put pressure on the wound to staunch the bleeding." He handed her a towel.

Both of their human companions nodded in consent.

"Now." Donnie said. Casey grimaced slightly as he pulled the knife from her side as gently as he could. As soon as he was clear April knelt down and pressed the towel gently but firmly against her side as Donnie began to unwind some gauze. Meanwhile Raph took the knife from Casey and tossed it into an empty pizza box and muttered a choice curse word.

Mikey came out with a bowl of water in one hand, a cloth on his shoulder, and his pet Ice Cream Kitty in his other hand. Other side Leonardo emerged with Splinter.

Donatello assumed his older brother explained things to their surrogate father already but he felt the need to say, "We're sorry about this sensei, but she needed help and there was no way we could get her to a hospital in time even if we could even get to one without a problem."

Splinter nodded solemnly. "It is alright, my son. I understand." He assured him and came to look at her. "She has been through quiet an ordeal." He noted. "And not just because of this incident."

Raph glared at Mikey. "Why'd you bring that out?" He questioned as his glare slid to Ice Cream Kitty.

"Some people find animals very relaxing." Mikey responded and then stuck his tongue out at him. "At least, when they're awake." He added. She added her own, "Mrow."

While that went on April gently sat the girl up so that Donnie could apply the gauze around her waist, dropping the blood soaked towel. She kept the blonde as still as possible. "Is she going to be okay?" April asked.

"I believe she will recover." Splinter reassured her and glanced at Donatello. "Do not forget to warp the gauze tight around her broken ribs."

Donnie nodded. "Of course." He agreed, already having factored that in. "As far as I can tell the knife wound is a clean stab. No ruptured or damaged organs." He said and when Splinter didn't correct him he moved on. "The ribs also seem to have been broken clean, at least they'll heal properly on their own."

"I don't think that kind of thing is new to those guys." Leo remarked dryly.

"Is there anything else we can do to help her heal?" Raph wondered.

"When she wakes, I can brew her tea that has healing properties." Splinter answered.

April shook her head a bit. "Too bad all of these weird Kraang powers don't include the ability to heal." She lamented.

"I'd still like to know who those guys were, who they worked for." Leo noted.

"You and me both bro." Raph agreed.

"Perhaps when she is able to, she will provide us with answers." Splinter said. "For the moment once she is taken care of she should be allowed to rest."

A few hours passed. Splinter retired to his sanctuary to meditate. Leo spent some time trying, and failing, to play pinball. After taking a few moments to clean the blood off of him, Raph took his roiling emotions out on the punching bag. Mikey had returned Ice Cream Kitty to the freezer after figuring out the girl would not be waking for a while and then he and Casey sat on the floor watching an episode of Crognard the Barbarian, their new favorite show. Donnie and April had reluctantly left the lair to get some pizza for a late dinner.

A small moan drew their attention as they saw the girl slowly getting up. Her hand went to her side and seemed surprised that it was bandaged up. "My brother Donnie and our friends April and Casey took care of that." Mikey explained as he stood up.

"Where am I?" She asked, her throat raw.

"You're in our lair." Leonardo explained as he started toward the couch. He looked at Mikey. "Get her a glass of water." The orange masked turtle nodded and started toward the kitchen.

"Who're you?" Casey asked her. "Why were those goons after you?"

"I…" She started and coughed.

"Let her get some water first, man." Raph said to Casey. He nodded in agreement.

Donatello and April came in with a few pizzas and a small bag from a local grocery store. "She's awake." April noted happily.

"Just now." Casey said.

Donnie set the pizza down to get his first aid kit in case she needed it further and April followed suit, heading toward the couch now. "She doesn't seem to fazed by everyone surrounding her, if you know what I mean." Casey said, subtly implying the mutant turtles in case she hadn't noticed beforehand.

Mikey came out with a glass of water and, much to Raph's chagrin, Ice Cream Kitty. He set Ice Cream Kitty on the table and then handed her the water. "Here you go." He said gently.

She nodded and took the water, taking a small drink. "Thanks." She replied softly and then took another sip. After another moment of drinking she looked at everyone. "Thank you for saving me." She said softly, almost as if she thought it shouldn't have happened.

"What were those morons' problems?" Raph asked.

"They were supposed to take me back to my fath…our employer." She explained.

No one missed the fact she seemed about ready to say father. The starting parallel to Karai shocked Leo a bit, though unlike their prodigal sister this girl seemed to have no problem thanking others.

"What's your name?" April asked her gently.

"Jennifer." She answered as she moved some of her blonde hair behind her left ear. "Jennifer Quinn."

"Why did your employer have those men come after you Jennifer?" Asked Master Splinter softly as he came out of the dojo.

The girl did a small double take at the sight of a giant rat walking and talking but like with seeing the turtles she seemed to take that in stride. "My usefulness to him hasn't ended." She explained. "I ran and he's not ready to let me go."

"Too bad for him." Raph stated.

"I assume if you left that means you don't want to go back." Leonardo surmised. She nodded her head slightly and he crossed his arms over his chest. "Then you won't be going back. The Turtles of Justice will keep you safe." He stated, drawing small moans from Raph and Donnie.

Splinter nodded. "I agree. We will keep you safe." He looked to April. "Show her to the restroom so that she may shower." He said. "Then we will make something light for you to eat."

"Too bad." Jennifer noted as she gingerly stood. "I like pizza."

Mikey laughed. "Me too." He said happily.

"I do not think you should try that right now." Splinter said. "I suspect you haven't had anything substantial to eat in a while and we do not wish to make you sick."

"Master Splinter is right." Leonardo said. "We don't want you to get sick."

"Come on." April said as she gently took Jennifer's hand. "I'll show you to the restroom and the shower. I have some shampoo and conditioner here for when I need it and we stopped by my aunt's place to get you some clothes that she used to wear. It should fit you." She explained.

The guys watched the two girls head down toward where the turtle had their rooms and then looked at each other. "Her father?" Casey said quietly, incredulously.

"That seemed to be what she was going to say." Donnie agreed.

"Bummer." Mikey noted as he placed his hand gently on Ice Cream Kitty's head.

"There is more here than we know." Splinter cautioned them all. He glanced in the direction where the two girls had gone. "There is more here than I suspect even Jennifer knows."

Donnie kept the gauze and tape out. "Might as well keep these out." He noted. "She'll probably need her bandages changed after she's done."

"He's not done with her." Raph repeated. "What could that possibly mean?"

"Maybe she has some super powers." Mikey suggested.

Raph rolled his eyes and bonked his little brother on the head with his fist. "If she had super powers she wouldn't have been letting those guys beat up on her dummy." He retorted.

"Do not underestimate the influence men such as those can have on their children." Splinter cautioned Raphael. "If he convinced her it was necessary it is likely she would let that happen. Some of those bruises and cuts are old enough to support that idea."

Leo didn't say anything but he fully agreed. All one had to do was look at Karai and how much she had believed their arch nemesis The Shredder until she had seen the picture their sensei had of her, him, and her departed mother Tang Shen.

"Something tells me she isn't Power Girl." Casey commented.

Splinter cocked his head a bit in consideration. Though Jennifer wasn't 'Power Girl' as Casey Jones had put it, he was sure something about her was special. Something about her, the only other one who had ever resounded to him that way was April.

What secrets does Jennifer hold? What new threat has just presented itself? These questions will start to unfold. In the meantime, what would you like to see or happen? Review and let me know and I'll see about working it in.


	2. The First Arrival

Disclaimer: Don't own TMNT, blah blah science blah.

"Will you need help?" April asked Jennifer nervously. She had never been around someone who was injured the way the blonde was. The closest had been when Leo had been beaten badly by the Shredder and his minions just before they had fled New York after the Kraang invasion.

Jennifer shook her head. "No, I can shower myself." She replied. "But I wouldn't mind if you stayed outside to talk." She replied. "I…don't get a lot of time to make friends."

April nodded. "Okay." She agreed.

Jennifer slipped into the bathroom and left the door open only a crack. April could hear the shower running and as she leaned against the wall she could see the Turtles, Casey and Splinter talking quietly. "Your employer." April started. "By that you meant your father, right?"

Jennifer was silent for a minute. "Yes." April barely heard the blonde admit.

The red head wasn't quite sure how to respond to that. "I'm sorry." She said. "I…don't really know too much about that. My father is a psychologist but he's a good man."

"You're very lucky then." She heard Jennifer say, her voice getting a bit harder to hear now. April suspected that the blonde girl had just stepped under the water. "Same apparently with your friends."

April bit her lip a little. It occurred to her she didn't really know that much about Casey's father. "What about your mother?" She asked.

"My mother died when I was around six." Jennifer answered her. "My father always said that she died of cancer. I do remember seeing her in the hospital for the last couple of weeks of her life, so maybe he was telling the truth about that one."

"I know how you feel. My mother…well she vanished when I was six." April said.

"Vanished?" Jennifer wondered.

April bit her lip. "It's complicated." She said as she folded her arms over her chest. "I…really don't know how to explain this easily." She admitted.

"If you don't want to I understand." Jennifer said, very softly. April had a feeling she spoke softly a lot. It made her wonder just how she had grown up.

April saw Mikey and Casey go back to Crognard. Splinter sat down on the couch. Donnie disappeared into his lab. Leo and Raph went to the pinball machine to try to play now that they knew at least Jennifer was going to be okay. "You know that invasion a few months ago?" She asked.

"I heard about it." Jennifer said.

"They call themselves the Kraang. They arrived a long time ago, and my grandfather tried to be nice and free them but they were evil and experimented on my family." April started. "I was there latest result. I was told that I displayed telekinetic powers early and my dad fled with me to New York. My mother was captured by the Kraang. I haven't seen her since."

Jennifer was silent for a moment. "But?" She asked as if she knew there was more.

"Well…when we fled New York we went to my family farmhouse. We discovered a Kraang ship in the cellar and it contained what I thought was my mother." April said, her voice growing a bit softer as she recalled the horrible episode. "It wasn't, it was a Kraang experiment that nearly killed us. But it felt like I lost my mother again…I don't even know where she is or if she's even still alive."

She heard Jennifer sigh a little. "I'm sorry. I wish I knew what was worse, knowing for sure or not being positive but fearing the worse." She commented. She thought now was a good time to switch tracks. "How are there four talking turtles and a rat?"

"I think the full story should come from Master Splinter." April replied. "But they basically came about because of something the Kraang have." She thought she heard a cap opening and then closing a moment later and it was followed by the scent of strawberries, the shampoo that April had there for the occasions she needed it.

"They seem cool." Jennifer said. "The one in the purple mask is really smart."

"Donatello has to be the smartest person I've ever met." April agreed. She had long ago stopped thinking of them as anything other than people, the time she got angry with them over her dad's first mutation notwithstanding. "Leonardo, the one in the blue mask is so courageous."

"What about the red masked turtle?" Jennifer asked her.

"Raphael." April answered. "He's definitely very tough. He has no problem risking his own life for what he believes in and what he cares about." April giggled a little. " Not so good with risking others' lives. And he can have a bit of an anger problem."

"And the other one?" Jennifer asked.

"Michelangelo." April replied. "He's so laid back. He knows how to make others feel more comfortable with them. Almost like a young kid. But don't underestimate him. He's just as brave as his older brothers and smarter than most people give him credit for…sometimes."

Jennifer giggled. April could then hear the water pressure going down and she assumed the other girl was finishing up. "And the rat, that's Splinter?" Jennifer asked and then added. "Wait, that sounds bad, doesn't it?"

"Don't worry about it." April assured her. "There's nothing wrong with saying that Splinter is a rat. Master Splinter taught them the art of ninja. He's also teaching me to be a kunoichi, a female ninja. He's basically their father and he was like a surrogate father to me when my own father became…well, mutated a while back."

"How did that happen?" Jennifer asked.

"An accident that happened with the guys." April answered. Her voice grew soft again, feeling embarrassed about how she had reacted at that point. "It…it took me a while to come to terms with that. I ignored them for weeks because of it before Casey told me about something that happened with a former friend of his, finishing with what Donnie told me too. Something's are just beyond our control." The red head took a deep breath. "I made up with them, and Donnie made a retro mutagen a little while later to cure him."

"And some things are only in our control." Jennifer said softly, so softly April wasn't sure she was meant to hear that. Perhaps the blonde hadn't even truly realized she said that. She stepped out of the bathroom wearing a pair of light blue jean shorts and a pink camisole.

Splinter noticed Jennifer emerge. "Michelangelo, will you please make our guest some chicken noodle soup?" He asked his youngest son and technically the chef of their sewer lair.

Mikey got up. "On it sensei." He answered.

"Let me check on your bandages." Donnie said.

The girls joined them in the living room. "Okay, go ahead." She agreed and sat on the couch next to the purple masked turtle and lifting her camisole up a so that he could check the bandages. "What's with the ice cream cat?" Jennifer asked.

"Mikey screwed up." Raphael told her. "Something about him having eaten ice cream, dropped some in mutagen, and the cat ate it." He thrust his hand at Ice Cream Kitty as if making a grand display. "And bam; one cat who melts out of the freezer."

"Is she sticky?" Jennifer asked, who in turn looked to her.

"No." April answered as she sat next to Casey. "She's not especially warm though."

Jennifer reached her hand out and cautiously stroked the top of Ice Cream Kitty's head. She thought the Neapolitan looking cat started to purr.

"It's really fun to put whipped cream on her head." Mikey said as he came out with a bowl of chicken noodle soup. "And she tastes so good and creamy too. You should totally try it."

"Oh, boy." Raph sighed and rolled his eyes.

"I think maybe I'll pass." Jennifer said softly.

"They bandages are okay for now." Donnie said. "I'll have to check them again in the morning."

Mikey handed her the bowl of soup and then retrieved the pizza boxes. Jennifer was a bit jealous that she wasn't able to have pizza.

"Don't worry about it." Casey said. "They have pizza like every night so you'll have more chances to eat it." He reached for his own slice.

` "We shall see how you do with the soup." Splinter said to her. "And then we shall go from there."

"Is there anything you can tell us about what happened? About what we can expect?" Leonardo asked Jennifer as he took a slice of pizza of his own.

"Yeah…" Mikey said as he started in on two slices of pizza himself. Everyone thought he might have said something smart, along the lines of anything they knew would help them to help her in the future but with his mouth full of pizza no one could know for sure.

Jennifer took a deep breath. "My father's name is Fulcanelli Quinn. He's been running his own crime syndicate for years, at least since my mother's death. We live in California, as far away from New York as possible without leaving the US." She started to explain.

"Wow." Casey gasped. "You ran a long way then."

Jennifer nodded. "Yeah, I guess that's true." She agreed. "Being based there basically prevented any of the gangs here from competing against him until he was ready for it."

"Does that mean your father is ready for it now?" Raph asked her as he took a piece of pizza with his sai.

"I guess so." Jennifer replied. "I've always hated the fact he chose to start doing this and did my best to talk him out of it, or pending that to ignore it until I could figure out how to get out of his life. But his syndicate went from the typical crimes to at least experimentation. That's when I ran."

"Did he experiment on you?" April asked. She couldn't say she remembered anything about the Kraang's experiments on her or her family but she knew it was there. Privately it creeped her out if she thought too much about it.

"Not that I know of." Jennifer answered.

Master Splinter suspected that she was unaware of some kind of experiments but with no proof the sensei kept his peace for the moment.

"He'd have to be well prepared." Donnie said as he leaned back to think, his thumb and middle finger absentmindedly rubbing his chin as he did so. "I mean he has to deal with the Purple Dragons, the Russian mafia that Ivan Strenako runs and the one Xever is in charge of too."

"Too say nothing about Shredder and the Foot clan." Raphael added.

"Remember what I told you guys." Casey interjected. "Shredder met the Italian mafia head in the bar that one night and because of Rocksteady and Fishface basically working for him that means Shred head basically runs the crime syndicates around here."

Raphael swallowed the bite of his pizza. "That's a hell of lot of things for your father to go against their Jennifer." He noted.

"I don't know how much my father is really aware of." She said.

"That might not be an issue." Splinter noted. "While the Shredder may essentially run the entire New York crime syndicate at least that 'unified' front would allow your father not to worry about a multi sided war. Just superior numbers."

"The four guys you beat tonight probably means my father isn't too far away. Nor for that matter are his forces." Jennifer said as she looked around at the Turtles.

"I say we make sure he realizes that he's got more to worry about than them." Raphael said as he smacked his left fist against his right hand in a punching motion. "Let's find some more of these guys and send 'Mr.' Quinn a message."

"That doesn't seem like a good idea dude." Mikey noted as he reached for his third and fourth slice of pizza.

"Michelangelo is correct." Splinter noted. "We are not to use our abilities for anything other than defense."

"I hate to say it Sensei, but I think Raph is right." Leo said.

"You do?" All three of his younger brothers, April, and Casey questioned in surprise all at once.

Splinter shot Leonardo a disapproving look but the blue masked turtle hastened to explain his thought. "Look, regardless of how much we try to stay out of this, innocents are going to get hurt in the crossfire between Shredder and all of his goons and Quinn and whoever else he decides to bring along." He looked from Master Splinter to the rest of his team and Jennifer. "If we show him that the crime syndicate aren't the only things to worry about he's going to have to reconsider whatever plans he may have."

"I wish I could offer more." Jennifer said softly. Splinter placed a comforting hand on her shoulder, which surprised her since she hadn't felt that kind of affection since her mother had died.

"Leo has a point." Donnie agreed reluctantly.

Splinter sighed softly and looked across the room a moment. Then he looked to his sons. "I cannot say that I am happy about this turn of events, but like Donatello I can understanding your reasoning Leonardo." He admitted.

"So we go out looking for trouble?" Raph asked, kind of gleefully.

Splinter could not say he approved of Raphael's attitude but he more or less got it right. "Finish dinner and then resume your patrol. If something comes about, as might be the case if Jennifer is right about her father's intentions, then put him on notice. Perhaps he will rethink his plans." He ordered.

"I wish I could go with, but I should go home." April said. "I need to help my dad out at home, plus he's still a bit skittish after his second reversed mutation."

"I can walk Red home and then join you guys." Casey volunteered.

"Home…" Jennifer murmured a bit as she looked down. She hadn't had a real home in years, and she couldn't go back to the place that used to substitute for home now anyway.

"You may stay here as long as you like Jennifer." Splinter promised the blonde girl. "We have the spare room that April used a while back when she had to stay here and you may use it now. I suggest when you are ready you should rest as well. You need to heal."

"Thanks." She said. She reached over and gingerly scratched under Ice Cream Kitty's chin.

Thirty minutes later everyone had finished eating. April made up the spare bed for Jennifer while the guys got ready for their patrol which included Mikey returning Ice Cream Kitty to the freezer. They then left the lair and headed toward the surface. The Turtles decided to return to the alley they had rescued Jennifer at for any clues while April and Casey went the other way towards her apartment.

"It's weird." April noted as she walked beside Casey. "Jennifer has a few things similar to Karai."

"Maybe she is Karai." Casey suggested, half joking.

April rolled her eyes. "Doubtful, Jones." April replied. "Their attitudes are about as different as two people can get."

The two teens started to walk by a small club. There were other teens from their school, from different grade levels, waiting to get in. There were also some young adults there. Both of them noticed Fong, Tsoi, and Sid, the three constant members of the Purple Dragons. Although their leader Hun was not with them, they had five other men with them, a first as far as either of them knew.

"What do you think they're up to?" Casey wondered as he slowed down.

"Maybe nothing." April said, although her voice sounded suspicious too. "Maybe we should contact the guys."

Casey wanted to argue and say they could take them. But four to one odds were pretty bad, even if they were talking about the dragons. He looked up a bit and thought he saw something on the roof. "Hey, Red." He said and nodded his head.

April looked up and for a split second saw shadows and then nothing. "Is someone up there?" She wondered.

From out of nowhere a group of completely dark blue clad figures appeared. For a moment April thought it might have been Footbots but their movements clearly showed they were human. The Purple Dragons moved to react while the rest of the crowd started to disburse.

"Those aren't the foot." Casey noted as he withdrew a baseball bat.

"No, there costumes are different and you can tell by the way they move they're not robots." April agreed.

One of the clad figures took out a small thing that looked similar to the smoke bombs that Donnie had developed. The others ran toward the Purple Dragons and the two gangs started to clash. April hated to admit it but the Purple Dragons didn't seem to be bad fighters when they weren't against them or the turtles.

One of the figures jumped behind the Purple Dragons and threw a shuriken at Sid. He barely saw it coming and was able to dodge. The shuriken sailed past and landed right in the middle of Casey's bat. The hockey player, eyes wide as he realized that the bat was the only thing that stopped him from taking it in the face, promptly shook the mini weapon off his bat.

"Is that glowing?" April asked as she saw the shuriken fall to the ground. Casey didn't pay attention as he started toward the fight.

The one with the smoke bomb like object dropped it and smoke filled the area only for a moment. The smoke cleared quickly and for a moment April couldn't figure out what the point to it was. Her observation of the fight quickly changed that outlook. Fong had been about to attack a clad figure with a knife, but all of a sudden his attack slowed way down while his opponent used his glowing sword at normal speed to disarm the Purple Dragon of the knife.

She then noticed that Casey himself had an opponent turn toward him with a glowing bo staff very similar to Donnie. He lashed out at the hockey player with the staff with a move April saw Casey block back when he and Donnie had sparred at the farmhouse, but this time Casey's reaction time was too slow and he took the hit to the chest and it sent him sprawling.

April's mouth seemed to slow to form words but her mind put it together. _These guys are moving faster than us. That started after the smoke bomb thing was dropped. Their weapons though are glowing, just like…_ April looked down where Casey had shaken off the shuriken. It too was glowing. _Just like that, so if I'm right…_

April knelt down in slow motion and recovered the glowing shuriken. She still felt slow but it seemed as if her arm felt normal. She rose up and looked at the battle scene. She took a deep breath and expanded her senses just as Master Splinter had taught her. She then threw the shuriken, which moved at normal speed toward a clad figure who swung his sword just as the throwing object moved right into his arm. The guy grunted in pain and the sword flew out of his hand. That slowed him.

April didn't have as much training with a sword that she did with her Tessen's. But she didn't see she had a choice and she slowly made her way over to the weapon. One moment her hand reached out at slow speed, and then she clasped the handle of the sword and felt herself seem to go back to normal.

"Let's see if I can turn the tide here." April said to herself. The Purple Dragons were far from their friends but in this case she was starting to think that they were the lesser of two evils. She tripped the guy with the bo staff and yelled out, "Casey! Grab the staff! Think of it as a hockey stick!"

Casey did as his red headed friend had strongly suggested and grabbed the staff. "This is better." The hockey player agreed as he grinned broadly, basically showing off the gap in his front teeth. He then smacked aside another of the clad figures, as well as one of the new dragons. "Oops." He added sarcastically and laughed.

"You're going to regret this interference little girl." Another of the clad figures threatened as he stepped up to fight April.

"Don't count on it." April responded as the two of them clashed their swords. She hated the fact just one action made her feel as if she were going to drop the sword.

Meanwhile the turtles searched the alley and finally Raph stated the obvious. "Nothing, nada. A waste of time." He groused and turned to Leo. "What now, fearless leader?"

Leo thought a moment. "I think we need to start looking around and see if we run into any trouble now." He said.

"I don't get it, there was no way any mess we made here could be cleaned up this quickly." Donatello mused as he looked around again. "I mean, the blood Jennifer left behind wasn't cleaned up." He added as he pointed to the small puddle of drying blood that had come from Jennifer's side when she had stood up.

"Maybe we're dealing with black magic." Mikey suggested as he sat on a trash can.

"Get real." Raph snapped at his younger brother.

"Maybe Mikey's right." Leo interjected. "I know it sounds weird, but we are mutant turtles created by an alien substance."

"And we did deal with Ho Chan, who was a ghostly Chinese sorcerer." Donnie supplied. "And magic may be the one way to even have a chance of countering Shredder and his overwhelming forces."

"I would think you wouldn't believe in magic." Raph noted.

Donnie shrugged. "I would really rather not." He admitted. "But we've seen plenty of things that defy normal explanation. Maybe magic is just a type of science that nothing we know of can explain."

There was a loud crashing sound and Leo, Raph and Donnie jumped. They turned only to find that Mikey had slipped and fallen off the trash can, creating a nice little mess to go with the loud noise. "Oops, my bad." Mikey said sheepishly as he gave a wide smile.

"Mikey!" Raph growled as he went over and smacked his younger brother upside the head. "Don't do that!"

Leo thought he saw red eyes looking at them from the end of the alley but when he squinted his eyes to take a closer look nothing was there. "I think I'm starting to see things now." He muttered to himself.

"If Mikey is right, what do we do?" Raph asked, somewhat exasperated. He thought magic was basically fantasy and even if it were true it was the last thing they needed to deal with.

"Let's confer with Master Splinter and see if we can do some research on any possible ides or leads." Leonardo decided. "We'll return to the lair so Donnie can surf the web and I think Master Splinter has some older books I can skim through."

"Alright, let's do it!" Mikey exclaimed, primarily happy about because he really didn't have to do anything. The four turtles headed again to the manhole cover.

"This could be going better Red." Casey called out as he barely blocked a sword swipe from another of the figures rather awkwardly with the bo staff.

"I know." April responded as she again barely managed to hold onto the sword she had appropriated from the wounded ninja clad figure.

One of the clad figures in back cocked his head suddenly as if hearing something that no one else, including April, could hear. Then he shouted out, "Fall back Goldens. We have new orders." The other clad figures backed up and with the drop of another smoke bomb, this one working exactly like what Donnie made, vanished. Time seemed to go back to normal instantly. Those who hadn't gotten away beforehand stood confused. The dragons made a very hasty retreat.

"Goldens?" Casey asked with a small giggle that wasn't quite as confident as he might have liked. "They named themselves after a dog breed?"

"I don't think it was that simple." April noted grimly. She wondered if it was a good thing or a bad thing that they had left the appropriated weapons in their hands. "I guess home is out of the question for a while." She took out her T-phone, dialed her home phone number.

"April?" She heard her father Kirby O'Neil on the other end.

She wished she knew how much to tell her father, but the base truth had to be said. "Dad, something important has come up. I'll be staying at the guy's lair for tonight."

Splinter sat meditating, but instead of doing so in the dojo or his sanctuary he did so in the middle of the living room. Part of it was worry for his sons and their admittedly reckless decision. He supported it as he understood the reasoning but he could not say he liked it. The other was just in case Jennifer needed him for whatever reason. His enhanced hearing allowed him to hear her slow and steady breathing, she was asleep for now.

It didn't seem to be long before he heard his sons returning. "That was quick." He noted neutrally. He wasn't sure if he should be annoyed at their lack of persistence or glad that they didn't seem to have gotten into too much trouble despite their recklessness.

"We thought we should come back and do some more research." Donnie answered. "Especially after Mikey's startling and actually intelligent suggestion."

"And what was that?" Splinter asked his youngest son.

"Hmm." Mikey said in thought and he squinted his eyes in concentration a moment before shrugging. "I don't know."

Raph sighed and brought his palm up to his face. "Oh, boy." He grumbled.

"Mikey suggested we might be dealing with black magic." Leo informed Splinter.

"My sons, there is no such thing as magic of any kind." Splinter lectured his sons. "I would think your encounter with Malachi was proof enough of that."

"I wouldn't be so sure of that." April's voice startled Splinter and the four turtles. They turned to see her with Casey, both of them holding their appropriated weapons from the fight. They could see the glow even from the human's position behind the turnstile. "Wait until you hear what just happened."

Note: The Goldens are a gang based around the Golden Triangle gang in the Archie TMNT comics.

Are the Goldens related to Jennifer's father? What is with the red eyes? These answers and more coming soon. Remember, if you'd like to see anything happen let me know and see what happens.


	3. Interlude: July 4th

Disclaimer: Again, don't own TMNT, just Jennifer.

Note: Taking a quick break from plot to do a July 4th themed story, but the good thing is we 'll get the first appearance of some old friends.

Between the research for the new problem, April decided they should spend the evening together and enjoy independence day. April borrowed her school friend Casey Jones to help her set up on the roof of her apartment building. She also convinced their new friend Jennifer to spend some time with them to allow her to get more comfortable around them.

It was approaching nine o clock at night and the turtles and their sensei Splinter would be there any minute. Casey was grilling up some hamburgers and hot dogs for variety but none the less April had picked up a few pizza pies from Antonio's. She was currently putting soda and water in an ice filled cooler while Jennifer was spreading a few blankest on the rooftop.

"Man, I remember seeing fireworks in Central Park years ago." Casey mused as he flipped a hamburger patty. "it was so loud and so awesome."

"Did you do anything for July fourth Jennifer?" April asked their new friend gently. She knew the blonde had not had the best childhood.

She nodded a bit. "The last year my mother was out of hospital we went to Disneyland for the week, including July fourth." She stared up at the darkening sky as her mind drifted back. "All those fireworks around the castle was so beautiful."

"I remember the last fourth of July at the farmhouse." April volunteered. "There is so much open space around the house before getting to the woods that you could see any of the fireworks displays going on for miles."

"I wouldn't think a place that isolated would have fireworks displays." Casey noted wryly.

April gave him a half mock glare, then shrugged. "Not legal ones anyway." She admitted sheepishly.

Both Jennifer and Casey laughed at that.

"A few years back, long after my father started running his syndicate and gave up any attempt at acting like he cared about me, I got together with my friends and we went to one of the beaches." Jennifer said as she smoothed out one of the blankets. "It got a little cooler at night despite the time of year and we had to make a small bonfire. The fireworks above the ocean was incredible. Watching them reflect off the water was just as amazing."

"That had to have been a sight to see." Casey agreed. "I think my little sister would have loved it."

"Fourth of July was never the same though after my father turned to crime." Jennifer said softly, sadly.

"I know what you mean." April assured her. She sighed a bit and got up to get the bags of chips laid out. "After we left the farmhouse, after we left mom, we tried to go about life like it was normal but it was never the same as that last fourth on the farmhouse."

"Man, you two girls are bumming me out." Casey joked. April was about to reprimand him, afraid that his joke might end up upsetting Jennifer but held her tongue when the blonde laughed a little at that.

"Hey," Jennifer called. "Here they come."

The three turned to see four turtles and a rat roof jumping toward April's apartment complex. The red head mused that she couldn't ever remember seeing her sensei roof jump in all the time she had known them.

"Hey, what up." Mikey called, being the first to land. Then he got even happier as he exclaimed, "Ooh, pizza."

"Help yourself." April said.

Raphael landed next. "Hey." He greeted and looked to Jennifer. "You have a good time with April and the knucklehead?" He asked. Casey stuck his tongue out as his friend and Raph laughed at him.

The blonde nodded and flashed the red masked turtle a smile. "Yeah, pretty great." She answered. "How about you?"

"Not too bad. Leo and I sparred this afternoon and I whooped his shell." Raphael bragged as he leaned against the buildings edge and grabbed a soda from the cooler.

"You just lucked out Raph." Leonardo said to his brother as he landed. "You know next time I'll get you."

Raph shrugged. "If you say so chief." He said.

Donnie landed next. "They had an easier time than I did, trying to find anything from what you were describing about that gang." He said. "And Leo didn't find anything yet in the books."

"Ah." April interjected. "No shop talk tonight. We're just going to enjoy each other's company tonight."

"Yes, ma'am." Donnie said with a smile.

Splinter immediately settled down on one of the blankets. "It has been a long time since I have seen fireworks for the fourth of July." Splinter said to them all calmly. "This was a wonderful idea April,"

"Thanks." April replied.

"Yo, Jones." Raph called out. "Burgers ready yet?"

"Got a couple coming out in just a couple of minutes." Casey responded. "Think you can hold on that long?"

Raph gave his friend a mock glare. "Yeah, I think I can manage that. I'm not a pig like Mikey." He said.

Mikey looked up, mouth full of pizza, and tried to make a comment that might have been resenting Raph's comment but really the fact he tried to do so with his mouth full arguably just proved his brothers point.

"Haven't you guys ever seen fireworks?" Jennifer asked the turtles innocently, as if the idea of four mutant turtles sitting in Central Park wouldn't cause a pretty decent panic.

"Nope." Leo answered as he opened up the bag of sour cream and onion chips. "That's the kind of thing that draws attention and we find most people treat us better when they don't know we exist."

April remembered Leo saying the exact same thing when she first took them to Murikami's.

"It's their loss then." Jennifer remarked simply as she stood up to get a bottled water. Because of that she didn't notice the slightly pleased look each of the turtles exhibited at such a simple but heartfelt comment.

Jennifer walked over just as Casey was taking a hamburger off the grill, placed a slice of cheese on top, added some ketchup and mustard, put it in between a sesame seed bun, placed it on a plate and brought it over to Raphael. "Here you go." She said.

Raph looked surprised for a moment. "Thanks, Jennifer." He replied as he took the plate.

April couldn't help but smile a bit at that one.

"I suppose no one could really be blamed for whatever they think about mutants." Mikey said after he had swallowed his current slice of pizza. "I mean for every good mutant like us there's like a thousand bad ones following." He then reached for another couple of slices of pizza.

"That's a bit of an exaggeration there Mikey." Donnie stated. "But he does have a point. I mean, every time we turn around another evil mutant seems to be showing up."

"How many have you seen?" Jennifer asked as she reached for a slice of pizza for herself. She had handled the soup well the night before and had even eaten an omelet that morning without any trouble.

"A lot." Leo said. "Snakeweed, Spiderbytez, the Squirrlanoids, Tiger Claw, Bebop, Rocksteady, Spy Roach, Justin, those giant wasps, Creep, that giant mushroom, Fishface, Rahzar…"

Mikey interrupted. "Who I used to call Dogpound until he got double mutated. Hah."

"You must have been the one who named them." Jennifer guessed as she smiled at Mikey.

"Yep, all except Tiger Claw, he came with that name." Mikey replied as he reached for another slice of pizza. "Except I was going to call him Tiger Claw anyway." He added, waving the pizza around slightly and making a bit of a mess on one of the blankets.

Leonardo made a hot dog and a cheeseburger for himself and made a hamburger for Splinter. He got them each some chips and a bottled water then came and gave his father his food. "Here you go." He said.

Splinter took it from with a small smile. "Thank you my son." Splinter said.

"Teacher's pet." Raph grumped to himself.

"But aren't there other good mutants out there, like you guys?" Jennifer asked just after she finished off her first piece of pizza.

"Sure there are." Donnie said. "For example there are the Mutanimals."

"Who are they?" Jennifer asked.

From the next rooftop they heard a slightly growly voice say, "That would be us." Everyone turned to see the speaker, Slash standing there. To the right of him was Leatherhead and to the left was Dr. Rockwell (aka Monkey Brains) and hovering above them was Pidgeon Pete.

"Leathehead!" Mikey exclaimed happily.

"Hello Michelangelo." The giant alligator said calmly with a small but wide smile on his face.

"Slash, how's it hanging?" Raph asked the giant turtle in the black mask that not too long ago really had been his pet turtle Spike before transforming himself into the form they saw now.

"It's going good Raphael." Slash said. "No mind control worms possessing us." He looked over to Master Splinter. "Again, I'm sorry about what happened."

Splinter held up his hand. "As I said, there is no need for apologies my friend." He said.

"Got any pizza crust?" Asked Pidgeon Pete. Raph rolled his eyes a little, annoyed by the hyper active bird.

Jennifer grabbed another piece of pizza and tore off the crust. "Here you go." She said to him, tossing the crust to him.

Pidgeon Pete caught it. "Oh, thank you. Thank you." He gushed and then started pecking at the crust.

"A new friend I take it." Rockwell said to Donatello.

"Your vast intellect allowed you to figure that out, huh." Donnie responded somewhat sarcastically.

"She seems to be taking all of this well." Leatherhead noted.

"Yeah, she took seeing us pretty well too." Mikey noted. "It's kind of cool. The guys kind of wonder why but we're cool with it. And we did save her life so maybe she decided our appearance is beside the point." He looked at all of the Mutanimals now. "Stay, hang out, grab a burger or three."

"We do not wish to intrude." Rockwell said.

Splinter cut in before Donatello could make a comment about agreeing ."It is alright. You are all family too." He stated.

"Hey, maybe we can make room for one more?" Casey suggested as they saw from a rooftop his and Mikey's new friend Mondo Gecko skateboarding across the edges.

"Sounds great to me." Mikey called and then yelled out, "Hey, Mondo! Over here!"

Mondo Gecko turned at the sound of his voice, then changed course to meet the others at the rooftop. "Hey, how's it hanging?" He asked. "Got some new friends, huh?"

"Yep." Mikey said. "Or at least new to you. These are the Mutanimals; Slash, Leatherhead, Pigeon Pete and Tyler Rockwell." He introduced as he pointed to the black masked turtle, the alligator, the pigeon and the monkey with the metal cap on his head. Then he leaned in and whispered, "Or as I call him Monkey Brains."

"I heard that." Rockwell said with a glare.

Mikey ignored it. "And guys, this is Mondo Gecko." He introduced.

"It is nice to meet you." Leatherhead said.

"You too dude." Mondo replied.

Slash got a few pieces of pizza of his own and some chips. "Who's your new friend?" He asked.

"My name is Jennifer Quinn." The blonde answered. "I just met the turtles after they rescued me from some guys who were sent after me."

"I am not surprised that the turtles were able to help you." Leatherhead remarked. "It is weird though that they let you see them. They are understandably very secretive."

"I was injured and they took me back to the lair." Jennifer explained softly. "And unfortunately they…we don't think that it's over yet."

"Again, no shop talk." April scolded.

"Sorry." Jennifer said with a small smile. She could easily remember her father being so devoted to his work that he forgot his daughter. It made her feel good to know that these friends, humans and mutants alike, were more interested in spending some time together in each other's company than worrying about life for a while.

"Wow, bizarre." Mondo Gecko remarked as he saw a hot dog float into the air, get placed into a bun, had ketchup and mustard added to it, and then float over to Rockwell. "You must be a psychic monkey. Awesome."

"How astute." Rockwell remarked. "But thank you anyway." He took a bite of his food.

"What's with the metal hat?" Mondo wondered. "Afraid of alien abductions, not that I can blame you around here." He was clearly referring to the recent Kraang invasion. It may have been stopped but considering that it was the second invasion in as many years a lot of people expected it to happen again.

"It amplifies and focuses my psychic powers." Rockwell explained to the reptilian skateboarder.

As they talked the sky was getting darker, and Splinter knew soon they would start shooting off fireworks. His sons had never seen those before, unless one wanted to count the multiple explosions that seemed to follow whenever they went on missions.

"Hope loud noises don't scare you." Raph teased Mikey. "Fireworks are really loud."

"Nah, I'll be fine dude." Mikey replied.

"Fireworks are so pretty; you won't even notice the sounds." Jennifer assured Mikey before she took a drink from her water bottle.

"Fireworks are so epic." Mondo Gecko stated. "I would like skate around at the ramp in Central Park and make the best turns to watch them go off." He looked at Mikey and Casey. "At least when I was human, before being splattered with mutagen last year."

"I can remember years of fireworks displays." Rockwell said. "When I was human, and in high school, I was the one in charge of setting up fireworks displays for my team's home games."

"That must have been neat." Donnie said sincerely.

"You were human?" Jennifer asked the two mutants, surprised. "I thought you were like the Turtles and Splinter."

"Actually my dear," Splinter interjected. "I was not always as you've seen me. I was born in Japan with the name Hamato Yoshi. I was only mutated on accident after moving to New York after the destruction of my home and family."

"I'm sorry." Jennifer said to Splinter. "I didn't know, that must be hard."

"When we return home, I will show you the few pictures I have." Splinter said.

April and Leo exchanged glances. Both of them knew trying to explain the group's complicated past with Karai, who was born as Splinter's daughter Miwa, was going to be something else.

"I myself was mutated when my former colleague Falco combined my DNA with that of a monkey, all to get the same sort of psychic powers that I ended up with." Rockwell supplied.

"That's mean." Jennifer noted sadly. "I hope he paid for that."

"Not exactly." Leo said. "When we first confronted him and Donnie beat him, he got away. Then he experimented further and it got botched up. He ended up being able to communicate with the rats of the city and called himself the Rat King."

"Lame name." Mikey coughed in between bites of pizza.

Raph sat next to Jennifer. "Slash was actually my pet." He confided to her quietly so that way Slash wouldn't over hear, not wanting to offend his friend but deciding she should know this story too since she had basically learned the others. "The name I gave him was Spike, and I told him everything. I got into it with my bros one day and he decided to get into some mutagen to give me what he thought I wanted, to fight crime all the time."

"That's kind of sweet, I think." Jennifer said.

Raph shook his head. "Not exactly. When he first mutated it warped his brain and he tried to kill my brothers. But that effect started to wear off and we made peace with him when he helped us stop the Kraang and his former partner Newtralizer." He replied.

"Mikey again?" Jennifer asked with a giggle.

Raph chuckled. "Nah, that one is all Donnie. He ran into Newtralizer while rescuing April's dad from a Kraang 'detention facility'." He answered, raising his hands and air quoting the last two words, making Jennifer think there was some inside joke to that one. "Then we met up with Slash and the Mutanimals after coming back to New York. He had been convinced by another friend Jack Kirby to assemble a team to fight the Kraang. They ultimately helped us send the Kraang packing."

"And what did Slash mean about what happened to Splinter?" Jennifer asked.

"Shredder had one of his minions Bixter Stickland make a mind control worm and tested it out on Slash and Rockwell. We brought them to the lair and Slash hit Master Splinter with that big mace of his. Then they attacked the rest of us and took me back to Shred head where they used the mind control worm on me and made us fight the rest of our teams before Leo got me to fight the control by pissing me off." Raphael explained. "Donnie did the same with Rockwell and he freed Slash." He couldn't repress a slight shudder. "Man, those worms were nasty and the way it felt to have them crawling around in your head…"

Unexpectedly Jennifer reached out and took Raph's hand. "It sounds horrible. I'm sorry that happened to you guys." She said and gently squeezed the red masked turtle's hand softly.

Raph had a sudden feeling he was blushing a little. "Uh, thanks. It's no big deal though, we've all had moments like that." He replied.

"I'm sure." Jennifer said. Neither noticed that they still held hands.

There was a loud popping sound and they all turned as a green firework exploded in the air in a flash before dissolving. This was soon followed by three more going off.

"Awesome." Mikey and Mondo said in unison.

"Man, this is off to a good start Red." Casey noted with humor.

"Yeah." April agreed as she sat down in between Donnie and Casey. Donnie gave off a nervous chuckle.

More fireworks burst in the air, eliciting some oohs and aahs. At one point Mikey released a "Cowabunga!" while Mondo Gecko released a "Booyakasha!" both of which made Raph roll his eyes a little but said nothing else.

As the fireworks started to wind down, Jennifer turned and looked around at her new friends, some very recent and some still kind of new. Her eyes went from Leo and Splinter. To Donnie, April and Casey. To Slash and Rockwell, she didn't see Pigeon Pete and wondered if he had went into hiding when the fireworks started as no one was paying attention to anything else at that point. Her eyes went to Mondo Gecko, Mikey and Leatherhead and then stopped at Raphael.

She took a deep breath. "This is what I've always wanted the holidays to be about." She revealed to them all. "To be together with those that you care about, to celebrate the moment and remember what they're all about, regardless of whether celebrating a birthday or to be thankful. To celebrate independence, whether it be as a remembrance for being liberated from oppression a long time ago or being free to choose who you spend your time with and care about in the here and now. This is what it should be all about."

Splinter chuckled and rewarded her with a warm smile. "I do not believe I could have said it more eloquently, my dear." A sadness reached his eyes as he thought, _Though this will never be complete until the day that I have my daughter Miwa sitting at all of our sides._

There was more banging as suddenly there was a last burst from the fireworks display, showering their world in multi colors. Jennifer gasped and murmured, "So pretty."

"Yeah." Raph said, his gaze unconsciously sliding over to the blonde sitting next to him, who still had not released his hand since there heartfelt conversation before the fireworks started. He noticed how her blonde hair seemed to shimmer with all of the fireworks dazzling, a sight that was reflected in her expressive light green eyes and he felt a small smile cross his lips. "Yeah, they are beautiful." He echoed, not sure what sight he was complimenting more.

A/N: Hey everyone needs a break from life, even the turtles. This is the first appearance of the Mutanimals, and Mondo Gecko, here but it I will spoil now it won't be the last. Can't wait to get reviews here. Next time we'll start getting some reactions to the new gang.


	4. Starting Answers part 1

Disclaimer: Don't own TMNT, yada yada, we all know the drill. Only own Jennifer.

Shredder narrowed his eyes as he sat on his throne. Below him stood Ivan Streanko, a former Russian mafia leader who he turned into a mutant rhinoceros. Next to him was Anton Zeck, a former thief who he turned into a mutant pig. Next to him was Xever, the purple mutant fish with mechanical legs and beside him was the skeletally thin mutant dog named Chris Bradford.

Just behind the four mutants and hovering just slightly above was the mutant fly Baxter Stockman. Below him was his mind controlled mutant half snake adopted daughter Karai. And right in front of the entire mutant group was his second in command, the mutant Tiger Claw. The robot Foot Soldiers could be seen patrolling the edges of the room for this very important meeting.

"We seem to have some new players on the field." Shredder announced to his henchman. "According to Hun some of his incompetent minions were attacked by what seemed to be ninjas in dark blue." He looked slightly up. "Stockman." He barked.

"Yezzz, Mazzzter." Stockman intoned and with a push of a button one of his Mousers stepped forward and opened its mouth. In the back a small holoprojector was activated and it displayed a digital image of a few of the new ninjas. "Thizzz image wazzz captured by the zzzecurity camerazzz at the club where the attack originated."

"The riders of the worm." Tiger Claw growled low in his throat as he saw the image of Casey Jones and April O'Neil in the background.

"Undoubtfully the human allies have informed the Turtles about these new arrivals as well." Bradford noted. "But the question at hand would be who are they?"

"I have never heard of them, they must not originate in New York." The large Russian rhino said.

"I recognize the insignia on their shoulder." Tiger Claw voiced. "They are a gang known as the Goldens and they have recently surfaced in Japan."

Shredder was a bit annoyed that he hadn't heard of another ninja clan in Japan before now but would privately concede that his efforts of late had been devoted here in New York to eradicate his rat nemesis Hamato Yoshi, his wretched pupils and all of their allies.

"In addition Bradford and Xever recently saw the Turtles dealing with four other minions of unknown origin." Shredder said. "They were beaten by them, and they proceeded to disappear with the girl they were attacking. We don't know who she is. The minions disappeared after the fight, apparently into 'thin air'." The inflection in his voice made it clear he didn't believe that portion of the report.

"What are your orders father?" Karai questioned.

"Scour the city. Find these intruders and convince them to leave or destroy them, whatever the cost." Shredder decreed. "Make sure Hun and the Purple Dragons are aware of this order as well."

"As you wish, Master." Tiger Claw responded and looked to the rest of the group. "Spread out. Find them and destroy them. And if the Turtles or their allies get in the way then eliminate them too. No one must question the superiority of the Foot Clan."

Jennifer sat against the tree in the dojo as she watched the four turtles pacing each other, weapons drawn and ready for Splinter's order to begin the training session. April was to the side of the dojo practicing a kata of her own.

Splinter stood near the edge of the dojo area watching his son's preparations. Then he took a deep breath and announced, "This is a free for all, last turtle standing. Hajime!"

Donatello swung his bo staff in an arc. Mikey back flipped out of the way. Raphael blocked it with his sai and it struck Leo, who only slid back a little and then ran forward with his katana and swung it out. Raphael blocked it as did Donnie and both of them pushed their blue masked leader back.

Raphael glanced to the left and lashed out and kicked Donnie in the side. The purple masked turtle promptly dropped the staff as he yelped and Raphael took that opportunity to hooks his sais around Donnie's wrist and flipped onto his back. "That ends your run Donnie." Raph gloated.

"Not again." Donnie lamented as he rolled to the side to recover his bo staff and then went to sit on Jennifer's left side.

"Booyakasha!" Mikey called out as he jumped out at Raph. He moved to block Mikey but the youngest turtle actually intentionally over jumped and landed behind Raph. He tripped the red masked turtle and then back flipped out of the way, extending his nunchuck into his Kusarigama and wrapped up his legs and then released him in a twirl. Raph hit the wall hard.

"Ooh." Jennifer gasped quietly as she flinched.

"Ha, ha. Beat you bro." Mikey gloated.

Raph got up and for a moment glared at the orange masked turtle angrily but Splinter snapped, "Raphael, sit down." That warning combined with his glancing around and seeing Jennifer's concerned look allowed him to get his temper in check as he recovered his sais and sat on Jennifer's right side.

"Just you and me Mikey." Leo said.

"Bring it dude." Mikey responded. "I am on FIRE!" He swirled his Kusarigama around and ran toward his oldest brother.

Leonardo waited patiently and as Mikey swung his chained weapon at him, he simply raised one of his katana and let the chain wrap around his weapon. He pulled his weapon away and the two fell to the ground. He then leg swept Mikey off of his feet. Mikey flinched on his way down and when he opened his eyes he saw the point of Leo's other katana just inches from his face. "Game over." Leo stated.

Splinter agreed. "Yanmea," He called.

Both Mikey and Leo recovered their weapons. Mikey sat next to Donnie, basically about as far away from Raphael as he could get in case his brother's temper decided to resurge and that left Leo to sit next to Raph.

"That was awesome." Jennifer said. "And so intense."

"I know, right." Mikey agreed.

"Well done my sons." Splinter complimented. "You all fought well and, perhaps just as importantly, accepted your losses gracefully."

"Isn't it bad for them to lose a fight though?" Jennifer wondered idly and then looked as if she wished she could take it back, thinking this had nothing to do with her and that she spoke out of turn.

Splinter smiled kindly at her. "It is alright, and it is indeed a good question." He looked to April who stopped her kata and sat by Leo before their sensei continued. "While it is true in a real fight where your lives depend on it, victory is the most important thing. But as all of you have learned at least once in your time, life does not always work out that way. Sometimes how you handle yourself in defeat or loss speaks more volumes about your character than your victories."

Jennifer didn't know any of them well enough to be sure they had experienced that kind of feeling. But then she thought about Raphael talking about his pet turtle mutating and what happened with April's mother and the thing in the woods that posed as her mother and realized she was wrong, at least two of them had been there before and it was very conceivable the others had as well.

Splinter let that sink into each of his pupil's minds for a moment and then said. "That is all for today."

The six of them got up and headed into the living room where Casey was playing a video game on TV.

"Dude, finish up already." Mikey said. "Crognard is almost on."

"Alright, alright." Casey replied absently.

"You have to give Mikey credit, that move was pretty incredible." Jennifer said to Raphael.

If anyone else had said that to him the red masked turtle probably would have made a snippy comment but with Jennifer somehow it just didn't seem…didn't seem right to him. "Yeah, I guess." Raphael grudgingly admitted. "But it would have been better if it weren't at me."

"I bet all of your brother's have had that thought at least once during your sparring sessions." Jennifer pointed out.

"Probably. Except for Leo." Raph replied. It was kind of a joke and he was glad that the blonde giggled a little at it.

Leonardo went to a little table set up just above the main living room area and sat down cross legged in front of it. On top of the table were over a dozen older books. "Nothing in these so far say anything about those weapons that April and Casey brought back." Leo noted.

All seven of them glanced back at a corner where they had stuck the katana and bo staff that had white light radiating all around them. "Remind me again why that matters." Mikey said.

"Because if Casey and I hadn't acquired those weapons we might not have been able to be here to have this conversation." April replied. "When those guys used their first smoke bomb it slowed time way down except for those who held those weapons."

"And they had to be a normal size." Casey added as he tried to finish up that level. "When Red picked up that throwing star thingy it didn't make her move normally. That didn't happen until she got her hands on the sword."

"Shuriken." Jennifer echoed, trying to commit the previously foreign word to memory and receiving small smiles from her companions. "I can tell you that at least as far as I know, whoever those guys were that April and Casey encountered, they aren't on my father's payroll. He didn't have that kind of ability at his disposal."

"Which actually means we might have more than just Fulcanelli's gang and the Foot to worry about." April voiced the realization for all of them.

"And we're running out of time." Raphael stated. "Sooner or later, if what Jennifer told us is true, some kind of war is going to hit the streets and we won't be able to handle it if we're moving slower than Mikey's brain."

"True, true." Mikey agreed and then realized what the red masked turtle had said. "Hey."

Donnie ignored them. "The problem April and I have ran into when researching on the internet is we have no way of knowing what's true and what's false." He glanced up. "I can find anything from enchantments to rune carvings to outright weapons possession but none of those add up here."

"The enchantments might." April said. "But everything we've found on that is so vague that we couldn't hope to replicate that if that was what we decided needed to be done." She nodded her head toward the mystic weapons. "They have no marks or carvings to interpret as runes and I don't feel anything from them to indicate any sort of possession."

"Why is that important again?" Casey asked.

It was Jennifer who answered that one. "Even an inanimate objects possession would leave some kind of aura that, at least if I understand April's abilities correctly, would leave some kind of…echo or aura that she could read from it."

April nodded. "You got it right." She assured her friend.

"I think it's time to hit the streets and find these guys and get some answers from them." Raphael stated.

"In theory that might be the best idea." Donatello conceded. "The problem with that implementation is that only two of us can actually fight these guys right now on equal grounds if they choose to use that time slowing smoke bomb."

"So you and Leo could go then." Mikey suggested.

"So the smartest turtle and the most focused turtle go out and try to find answers from goons that might not even show up while the hot headed turtle and the party turtle continue research?" Casey questioned with a smirk. "That'll work out well."

Mikey wasn't quiet paying enough attention to realize that Casey had subtly insulted him. Raph caught it but when Jennifer placed her hand on his arm it made him stop in place. "Don't push it Jones." The red masked turtle still warned.

"Look, I can to the research on either the computer or the books." April volunteered.

"I can do the other one." Jennifer volunteered herself.

"I'm not sure Master Splinter would approve." Leo commented as he stood up. "But the truth is we have to start considering other avenues, and that's the only one I see." He went over and exchanged one of his katana for the mystic one and then tossed Donnie the mystic bo staff. "Still it might be too dangerous to go just the two of us. Raph, Mikey, you come with us too and let's just hope we don't run into that kind of trouble."

"Meanwhile April and I will stay here and pick up on your research material." Jennifer said.

"What about me?" Casey asked.

"Stay here with the girls." Leo answered. "If they find something while we're gone you might have to let us know what we need to do." He looked to his brothers. "Turtles, let's move out."

It quickly became apparent that patrol would have to be more subtle. No sooner did the turtles leave the sewers for the surface, did they ran into a group of Footbots. They were dispatched easily enough and the turtles made their way to the nearest rooftop.

Once they reached the rooftop Mikey pointed east of where they had just come from. "Dudes, more Footbots." He commented.

Raph drew his sais. "Let's take them out." He said.

Leo raised his arm to block Raphael. "No." He said.

"Why not?" Raph demanded.

"Think about it a moment guys." Leo said. "Why are the Footbots out here? They didn't know we were coming out right now. It's probably not us they're hunting for this time."

"Come to think of it, that brawl at the club Casey and April passed involved the Purple Dragons." Donnie said. "That means they reported what happened to Hun."

Raph caught on now. "And Hun probably told Shredder about it. Since it's a gang that Shredder doesn't control and seem to have at least one advantage they know of that has to make him extremely curious." He added.

"Shredder doesn't know that we're just as baffled about that advantage as I suspect he must be." Donatello supplemented. "That makes them a bigger concern that we are to him, at least right now."

"So doesn't that mean we're competing with them over getting information to put us ahead?" Mikey questioned.

"I'm afraid you're right Mikey." Donatello agreed. "We're going to have to be careful on how we go about this."

The turtles started to quickly but quietly jump rooftops. Twice more they had to wait for groups of Footbots to bypass them and they also had to avoid Rahzar and another group of Footbots. Leo was willing to bet by the mutant canine's movements that he had to have smelled the turtles but chose to ignore it.

"I guess that confirms one thing." Donatello said. "The Foot aren't out looking for us tonight."

"It's begun though." Mikey murmured.

"What are you talking about?" Raph asked.

"The gang war that Jennifer said her father was coming here for. "That's like five Footbot groups we've seen in the last half hour plus Rahzar. Shredder's other guys have to be out searching too, and who knows how many Footbots are still out there."

Leonardo frowned. "Again, hate to say it but Mikey is right again."

"Twice in one night." Raph joked deadpanned. "What is this world coming too?"

"To make matters worse, remember what Jennifer said." Donnie said. "These Goldens, as April heard them call themselves, isn't the same gang that her father is running. There may very well be more than two sides in this war."

"Not including us." Leo added. "This is shaping up to be bad."

"What could her father possibly be packing then if not these guys?" Raph wondered.

None of the boys naturally had an answer to that one. There next encounter left them a bit startled as they passed none other than Karai and about a dozen Footbots.

"What do we do?" Mikey asked quietly.

Leo hesitated. He wanted nothing more than to bring Karai back to Splinter and the rest of her family, but at the same he wasn't sure right now they could. Couple that with the fact that just because the Foot may not have been actively looking for the turtles, it didn't mean they wouldn't attack if the turtles presented themselves. "I guess we just have to let it go and move on for now." Leo decided.

This was when a dozen of the dark blue clad figures appeared in front of Karai and the Footbots. In the midst of them was a white clad ninja.

"That's new." Raph remarked, recalling nothing was said about white ninjas when April and Casey encountered them.

Jennifer got up, taking one of the books with her and headed into the dojo. She expected that Splinter would be in his room off the dojo but found him instead by a little altar by the dojo. "Master Splinter?" She inquired softly.

"Come in." Splinter invited her, setting a picture he was holding back on the altar.

"Is it okay to ask what that is?" Jennifer asked him.

"Actually, I promised I would show it to you on July fourth." Splinter recalled. Jennifer stepped up next to him and gazed at the picture with him. "That is a picture of me, when I was human. The woman next to me is Tang Shen, she was my wife. And the baby is my daughter Miwa." He explained.

Jennifer stroked the frame gently. "You guys look happy." She murmured softly. Then something occurred to her and she looked to Splinter. "I haven't seen any girls around here other than April. Did your daughter die when her mother did?"

Splinter shook his head. "No." He answered softly. "It is a bit complicated."

"If you don't want to talk about it I understand." Jennifer promised.

"No." Splinter answered. "If you are going to be staying with us for a while then you should know the whole story." He sat down and Jennifer sat across from him, laying the book at her side. "When Oroku Saki, the real name of the one you've heard us address as the Shredder, attacked by home and accidently killed my wife before leaving me for dead, he kidnapped Miwa to raise as his own."

"So where is Miwa? Where does Shredder have her?" Jennifer asked. She wanted to help out, though she didn't know how she could do so anyway.

"You have not met her, but you have heard the name that Saki gave her. He has named her Karai and trained her to be an assassin." Splinter answered.

"Does she know the truth?" Jennifer asked now.

Splinter nodded. "She did, in large part thanks to Leonardo. He instilled enough doubt in her mind that she agreed to come down here, though it was originally part of a plot to track us. When she saw we shared the same picture of her mother she realized she was being lied to by the Shredder."

Jennifer nodded silently and kept quiet. She didn't want to interrupt him again.

"At first she was taken by Shredder's second in command, but my son's rescued her. However I made the mistake of telling her what happened between us and she went after Shredder for revenge. He in turn used her as bait to try to lure us into a trap, but it backfired. He had her over a special batch of mutagen and when she fell into it she was mutated into a snake mutant." Splinter took a breath before continuing. "Donatello believes the mutagen was altered to allow for a form of mind control but somehow it also must have become mixed with some form of retro mutagen. As a result she could alter her form to either human or snake but her mind was slowly going. Donatello did later develop a retro mutagen of his own but because of Miwa's unique physiology it was ineffective."

"Can we find her? Bring her back here?" Jennifer asked.

"Somehow Shredder got his hands on Karai again. Just before you came into our lives Karai attacked us again, it appears that Shredder used the same mind control worm on her that he used on Raphael, Slash and Doctor Rockwell." Splinter explained to her. "Except Karai has not broken free of it. Donatello thinks perhaps her mind might not be strong enough to do so after what happened when she was mutated."

"I'm sorry to hear that." Jennifer said sadly. She took his hand. "There has to be a way to bring her back though."

"I…we have not given up hope." Splinter assured her. "In time a solution will present itself." He seemed to rise up a little as he said, "However I do not believe you came here expecting this conversation. What can I do for you?"

Jennifer reached for the book. "I wanted to ask you about this to make sure, but if I'm right I think I understand now how those weapons became enchanted and maybe we can even do something to prepare ourselves." She explained.

For a moment all was quiet, and then Karai smirked. "I guess we can get the answers father wants from one of these guys." She said.

"Your Shredder's daughter?" One of the men guessed. "We can send him a message using you as the messenger."

"I'll be happy to relay your last words." Karai replied.

"It's not really a speaking message, more like multiple messages that involve finding multiple pieces." Another said.

"What kind of message is that?" Mikey wondered.

"The kind we don't want them to deliver using Karai." Leo answered as he drew his katana. "It's time to step in."

"I thought we were walking away." Raph said.

"That was before we found the whole reason that we came out here for." Leonardo replied. "Get ready team."

Each of the turtles drew their weapons, abandoned their hiding spot on the rooftop and dropped on the scene.

One of the men gasped. "Our weapons." He noted.

Raph snickered. "Your weapons?" He questioned. "That's what you notice, not the fact that there are four talking turtles standing here ready to kick your butts?"

For a moment neither side said anything, and then Karai drew her Tanto, a short sword. "Well, this is going to be interesting." She deadpanned. Then she looked to the Footbots. "Attack them all."

What did Jennifer discover and how much can it help? How will this first showdown go? Can Leo get through to Karai and will he even try? Find out next time.


	5. Starting Answers part 2

Disclaimer: Again, don't own TMNT, just Jennifer.

Somehow it seemed wrong to Leo to here Karai say it. "Well, this is going to be interesting. Attack them all."

"Well this is going to bite." Raph noted as one of the golden ninjas jumped at him. He blocked the oncoming sword with his sais and then kicked him back.

Karai swung her Tanto at Leo but he blocked it with his katana. "Karai, snap out of it." Leo said. "This isn't you; you need to fight that mind control worm."

"You have no idea what you're talking about Leo." Karai commented with a smirk as she tried to attack Leo again. She didn't see the white ninja gun for her, but the blue masked turtle did and he tackled Karai out of harm's way. The white ninja's sword grazed the back of his shell.

"Dude, careful." Mikey called out and failed to heed his own advice as one of the Golden's kicked him in the side, and he went sprawling.

Donnie took out a Footbot and turned his way to stop a golden ninja from stabbing at him. "These guys are quicker than the Footbots, I think." He voiced.

"You might be right." Raphael admitted as he took out one of the Footbots and then turned around to kick a golden ninja in the stomach. He flew back but to his credit recovered on his feet.

Mikey recovered and used his nunchuck to slam one of the Footbots out of his way and started toward the ninja that had kicked him. "You are so going to regret that dude." Mikey said. He gave off a snicker as if he didn't believe Mikey.

Donnie blocked two golden swords that were brought down at him with his bo staff and then flipped the swords out of their hands before delivering a spinning round house kick to the jaws of both ninjas.

"Karai, we can't fight each other and this guy at the same time." Leo said. "We have to work together."

"I don't think so." The kunoichi stated as she began to pace both of them. It bothered Leo to hear Karai say that, she didn't think he would've heard that if not for the mind control worm. The white ninja attacked Leo this time and he blocked the attack, but something about it seemed wrong. When he swung his katana at the white ninja it almost seemed to go right through him.

Raph saw that as well. "What the hell? What, is he a ghost or something?" He wondered.

The white ninja elbowed Leo in the face and sent him sprawling back. As Leo started to get up he told his brother, "He feels solid enough."

"Fascinating." Donnie commented. "He seemed to dodge that strike like he's thin air but delivers sold attacks."

"Yeah, peachy." Raph commented sarcastically as he jump kicked one of the dark blue clad ninjas.

Leo noticed that all of the Footbots seemed to be down, and while about half of the Goldens were down they still had half to go plus the white ninja.

Splinter nodded his understanding after Jennifer's reveal. "It makes sense, similar to the healing hands enchantment I just recently taught Leonardo." The rat sensei said. "Except this is done with the weapon instead."

Jennifer nodded a bit and went to stand up, flinching in pain when her sides complained about it. "Yeah, healing hands might be great right about now." The blonde said somewhat jokingly. "I don't know what's worse, a knife buried in the right side or broken ribs on the left."

"I have every confidence you will recover." Splinter assured Jennifer softly. "I have seen others with wounds less than yours who have shown far less strength and resiliency than you have." Splinter stood and helped the young girl up before he continued. "Show this to April, perhaps she can find something that may supplement this project. Since this enchantment requires inanimate objects we will need a few herbs to make this work, which I will retrieve."

Jennifer bowed slightly, ignoring the slight pain in her sides. "Yes, Sensei." She acknowledged.

Splinter watched the blonde leave the dojo and head over to the sofa where April sat with Donatello's lab top. She sat next to the red head and began to tell her what Splinter had concluded from her research, Casey stopping to overhear the conversation.

"Turtles." Tiger Claw growled as he and another dozen Footbots showed up at the fight. "Aligned with our enemies."

"Wrong, cat patch." Raph snapped. "We're not with those guys; we're just trapped right in the middle."

Tiger Claw laughed. "So you say, reptile." He looked to the Foot. "Attack."

"Oh, just great." Mikey grumbled. "Like we didn't have enough problems."

Tiger Claw landed on the ground and looked around to find Leo, and to a lesser extent Karai, engaged in combat with the white ninja. If Donnie didn't know any better he thought the mutant tiger actually looked kind of shocked.

"At least these guys are a piece of cake." Donnie said as he knocked over a Footbot onto the ground, then quickly picked up the metal body to block a katana slash from one of the Goldens, then pushed the inert metal body into the ninja.

Leo clashed with the white ninja and found himself on the rare receiving end of a bad match up as the Ninja flipped him to the ground with a loud thud. The blue masked turtle was slightly pleasantly surprised to see Karai try to attack the white ninja from behind. All that succeeded in doing though was turning the ninja's attention away from the turtle and onto the kunoichi.

"I'm starting to think we should have brought Casey with us after all." Donnie said to Mikey. "At least we'd have one more person fighting that we can actually depend on." He slammed his bo staff into one of the Golden's head.

"No kidding." Mikey agreed as his nunchuck became his Kusarigama and tripped up a few Footbots of his own. "And we know it's going to come down to us, Tiger Claw and Karai, and that white ninja."

"The sad part is if Leo and Karai are any indication, that white ninja still might just beat us all down anyway." Raph noted dryly as he took off the head of a Footbot and gave a bowling ball toss of it toward another Golden to trip him up.

Tiger Claw gave off a primal roar and jumped at the white ninja. That distracted him from both Leo and Karai and it slightly pleased and slightly worried Leo that the mutant tiger was more of an even match with the white ninja. Then again the blue masked turtle had to concede that this was the same mutant who had beaten three of the four turtles in combat and had a marvelous clash with Splinter that by all rights he should have won before he had Karai poison her father.

Leonardo tried to attack the white ninja but he saw it coming and dodged back. With a roar Tiger Claw swiped at Leo, but he barely dodged it and yelled out, "Watch it, I'm trying to help."

"We are not allies." Tiger Claw reminded Leo coldly. "First I take out the white ninja, and then we'll do away with you and your brothers."

"That's gratitude for you." Raph said as he kicked another of the Golden's and then knocked him out with the back of his weapon against his skull.

Mikey knocked out another Footbot. "Is it time for the victory dance yet?" He asked.

"Does it look like it?" Raph asked as he gestured to Leo, the white ninja, and the two foot clan members not two feet from them even as Donnie took out the last Footbot, still leaving three golden's.

"Raincheck on victory dance." Mikey noted solemnly.

Leo started to back up towards his brother since Tiger Claw seemed intent right now on the white ninja and Karai seemed just as content to let the fight go on.

"Think Tiger Claw can actually beat him?" Mikey asked his oldest brother.

"I suppose if anyone here can, it would be Tiger Claw." Leo said with a glance at Raphael. "He took down three of us after all with no effort."

Sure enough Tiger Claw drew his blaster and fired at the white ninja. The mystery opponent blocked with his katana and tried to attack Tiger Claw but the second in command of the Foot dodged it and brought his claws across the one open spot; his eyes.

"That'll be messy." Mikey started and was about to add something to that when they noticed the white garment fall to the ground, the sword disappearing, as did the figure that was formerly inside the garment as if nothing was ever there.

"Wow." Donnie said. "That was even more bizarre."

"Kind of awesome." Mikey said.

Tiger Claw looked to the four turtles. "Now it's your turn reptiles." He stated.

"We can take him." Raph said. "And Karai too if we have too."

"Turtles." They heard Rahzar growl. They saw along with the mutant dog was Fishface, Rocksteady, Bebop, and over three dozen Footbots. Unlike the turtles and even Tiger Claw and Karai, they were fresh and ready to fight.

"Or not." Donnie said and looked to Leo. "What now?"

"Raph, ninja vanish." Leo answered.

At his older brother's signal Raph took the smoke bomb that Leo had already suggested he had ready with a glance and dropped the smoke bomb to the ground. In a matter of moments the foot found that the turtles had vanished.

With only a low growl to show his frustration Tiger Claw moved on. "Continue the hunt. If any others show we do the same thing to them that we did here." They left the fallen opponents, knowing this would start the message that their master Shredder wanted to send.

Jennifer sat down on the couch with a glass of orange juice and took a small sip before leaning back. She felt a bit tired; she suspected that was probably because she was still healing. But she had already silently vowed she wouldn't even consider going to sleep until Raph and the other turtles had come back home.

"You okay?" April asked her.

Jennifer nodded. "I'm okay, just a bit worn out." She assured her.

"Unfortunately who knows how long before the guys come back." Casey pointed out. "You might be better off getting some rest now and someone can wake you when they come back."

Jennifer shook her head. "No, it's okay. I'll wait." She stated.

April watched her friend a moment, seeing the determination in her eyes to wait. If Casey hadn't been present she might have talked to the blonde about what she was starting to suspect the other girl was feeling. Sometimes she thought she might know something similar. "That was a good find, by the way." April said.

"Thanks," Jennifer said. "But really it wasn't my find. If Leo had had a few more minutes he probably would have found it himself."

"Maybe." Casey said. "But in the end, it was you who found it, not him."

"Casey's right." April agreed. "Don't sell yourself so short."

Jennifer nodded a little but really didn't say something. It was kind of an old habit of hers not to draw any more attention to her than she had to or already had. It was hard to break.

"It was very well done indeed." Splinter agreed as he came of the dojo. "Remember there is no 'I' in team. What one accomplishes can be considered a victory for all, but credit must be given where it is due."

They heard the turtles coming, each jumping past the turnstile. None the less they seemed a little less than thrilled. "What happened out there?" Casey asked.

"It's starting alright." Raph noted as he sat beside Jennifer, which did bring a small smile to her face though given the situation no one called attention to it. "Every one of Shredder's goons are out in force, each with about a dozen bots."

"We ran into more of those golden guys too." Mikey said as he went over and sat down just behind the tv. "They didn't use those bizarre time freeze bombs though."

"I wonder why." April mused.

"I think it's because of the Footbots." Donatello speculated as he sat down by April and ignored the look of annoyance on Casey's face. Right now he wasn't worried about jealousy. "I think no matter what they try to do to slow down people that has no bearing on machines, and at this point most of Shredder's army, except his top henchman and Karai, are machines."

Mikey had a blank look on his face. "I don't get it." He said.

Leonardo didn't sit but was pacing the length outside of the living room. "What Donnie means is that Shredder, or the Kraang, or Rigby or whoever can just fine tune the Footbots do move at a pace that would make those useless against them. They're only limited by their current design."

"Rigby?" Jennifer seemed confused.

"He means that mutant fly thing." Casey said.

"Buzzkill, we should have called him Buzzkill." Mikey added.

Leo ignored all of the chatter as he turned to Splinter. "But the golden's had someone else with them. A white clad ninja. He was really good, even better than both me and Karai. The only way he was beaten was because Tiger Claw showed up." Leo started to explain to their sensei and father.

"And when the fleabag finally did get a good solid hit on him, what would have been clawing a regular persons eye out, the white ninja instead just vanished." Raph picked up the story and then elaborated, "Or really the figure inside of it disappeared, leaving the white outfit and his weapon behind."

"Hmm." Splinter sighed as he looked toward the pond of water they had flowing in the back of the sewers. "If what you just described to me is what I think it is, then we have a bigger problem than I thought. Even Shredder's henchman may not be fully prepared."

"What do you mean, sensei?" April asked.

"They have always been mysterious and powerful." Splinter informed them all. "They wear white to symbolize the fact they were born into the art of ninjitsu."

"Like the turtles?" Casey asked.

"Even more so." Splinter answered. "It is also believed they wear white to signify the fact they have already entered the white light of death."

"Told you guys that was a ghost." Mikey said.

"No way." Raph said.

"No one really knows." Splinter told them all. "Many too believe the white ninjas are in fact ghosts but as far as anyone knows it has not been confirmed or denied." He now faced all of those in the lair. "One must have powerful skills to call upon, what would be thought of as magic."

"I thought magic didn't exist." Mikey said.

"Some forms must exist." Splinter conceded. "But many of those arts have been lost throughout time or simply forgotten, pushed aside for the modern world."

"If I took a cell phone to medieval times it would appear as magic to them, no matter how much or how well someone like Donnie or I could explain it to them." Jennifer said. "There could be some science behind the magic without us understanding."

"Speaking of things similar to magic," Splinter said. "Jennifer has found something in the books, an enchantment we can use in order to enchant all of our weapons so that when the Golden's use those time smoke bombs we will be immune."

"Awesome." Mikey said.

"What do we need to do?" Leonardo asked.

"All of you follow me." Splinter said.

"Come one, Jennifer. You should come too." Raph said to her and helped her to her feet as they all started toward the dojo. The blonde smiled and followed next to the red masked turtle.

Under the tree there was a blanket set out, two bowls of water on the top and bottom of the blanket. "Is that going to work?" Donnie asked doubtfully. There was no way his bo staff would fit in the confines of the blanket and he didn't think that Leo's katana swords would either.

"The space does not matter." Splinter answered his son. "What matters is the intent."

Each of the turtles set their weapons on the blanket. Splinter gestured for April to follow with her Tessen's. Splinter looked to Casey. "Is there a weapon of yours that you would like to be treated, Mr. Jones?" He asked.

"Hmm." Casey murmured and stuck his tongue out a bit as he thought about it. Then he nodded. "Yeah, give me a second." He left the dojo and they guessed Casey was going to his duffel of sporting good weapons that he left at the entrance to the lair and then he came back with an aluminum bat. "Here we go." He stated and placed it on the blanket.

"Shouldn't we enchant some shuriken too?" Jennifer asked.

Splinter nodded. "We will soon enough." He assured her. "But right now the primary weapons are the most essential."

Splinter then sat down in front of the weapons and began a chant. No one could really identify the language as it didn't sound Japanese, nor did it sound to April like French, which she had taken for a few years. Jennifer was familiar with Spanish and it didn't sound like that to her either. Even Donnie couldn't readily identify it, and while he couldn't exactly speak in every language he was familiar with most of the modern ones.

After a few moments Splinter rose. "It is done."

Leo stepped forward and passed the weapons back to April and the guys. "Now we should be ready for anything they want to throw at us."

"I better take a look at those bandages while we have a moment." Donnie said to Jennifer as they walked back out into the living room. The blonde sat down and let him see the bandages. He unwrapped them and took a look at her sides. He let out a little gasp.

"What's wrong?" Raph asked with concern.

"Nothing." Donnie said. "We only took care of her yesterday but that wound looks almost completely healed. It's still sore and there is a little bit of a scar but I'd be willing to bet that her skin will look brand new tomorrow."

"How about her ribs?" April asked.

Donnie felt her left side. "Healed, but it does seem a little inflamed." He informed them.

"How is that possible?" Jennifer asked.

"I don't know." Donnie answered. "Let me get a blood sample and we'll see what's going on."

Donnie went to his lab and came back with his scientific kit and extracted a blood sample, and Jennifer also decided it would be a good idea to let him take a hair sample. "It's going to take some time to figure out if something is going on." He told them.

"There shouldn't be anything going on with me." Jennifer said. "I'm just human."

"That's what I thought for a long time too." April reminded her. "Maybe your father did some kind of experiments on you after all." She suggested.

"Wouldn't she remember something like that?" Raph questioned.

"Perhaps not." Splinter answered. "Sometimes an experiment can be conducted with only something as simple as an extra ingredient in food or drink and simple observation."

"I sure had enough people around me to be observers." Jennifer noted quietly. It made Raph want to punch some of those observers.

"We'll have to wait for Donnie to finish up his tests." Leo said. "Right now we can at least be glad that it doesn't seem to be anything hazardous to either Jennifer or anyone else, and she's healing better than any of us expected and that can only be good."

"Right now I think should run with any good news we can get." Jennifer said to them all. "We don't know what tomorrow can bring after all."

What will Donnie discover about Jennifer? What is in the future for the gang war building up? Answers will come soon but next in line comes the premiere of a new side villain.


	6. A new May

Disclaimer: I of course don't own TMNT. Although I have altered character background for the 2012 series, the actual concept of the villain in this chapter isn't mine, was originally part of the Archie Ninja Turtle comics. I do own Jennifer.

She was running through the bland metal corridors with alarms going off all around her. She could hear from somewhere one of the Kraang speaking. "We must find the one known as the experiment, the one known as the experiment is not ready to be released from what is known as confinement."

"Stupid babbling fools." The girl muttered to herself. She had never heard them speak any other way though she was aware she did not speak that way.

Two Kraang droids rounded the corner and raised their blasters to shoot at her and she quickly dodged out of the way and then raised her hands to send them flying back into the wall. "You can't beat me, you brainless squids." She gloated. "I can see you coming from a mile…"

She was interrupted by the clicking of a blaster from behind her. "You will do what is known as surrender or you will be what is known as vaporized." Another of the Kraang droids stated. She cursed herself for getting too cocky when the place was full of Kraang. She raised her hands and the Kraang must have assumed it was a form of attack. "You were what is known as warned."

The Kraang droid unleashed a blast and the girl instinctively flinched only to find the blast reflected off of something around her and it struck the Kraang droid in the chest and sent it flying. "Well what have we here?" She wondered to herself as she reached her hand out and felt a protective bubble around her. She blinked as she thought of it and it vanished. She blinked and thought of it again and it reappeared. "Well, what a nice surprise." She stated. "I think I've just decided escape isn't the best option, for now."

She reached out with her mind and felt for the hub, the command center, of the secret Kraang laboratory and she started toward it. Whenever Kraang droids got in the way she simply pushed or crushed her way through them. "Look at what you created." She sneered. "And you can't do anything to stop when you lose control, and make no mistake that you have."

Inevitably she reached the command center and dealt with the Kraang there as well. She then called up their files, eager to learn what else they had been up to. What she found startled her. "Well, this is…something." She said with annoyance. "I know what I have to do. But first." She turned toward what could be a first person view and ordered, "You will come to me…" Before things started to go dark and…

April shot up out of her bed, sending her covers flying. She felt herself shaking from fear and she got out of bed to go to the window only to be disappointed to see that it was pretty much dark out there. Residential side streets of New York weren't nearly as active as those of Manhattan and to make matters worse it was that time of the month, the dark of the moon was upon them eliminating all aspects of moonlight. She turned to her nightstand and started to reach for her T-phone, wanting to call Donnie or Jennifer or Casey so she could talk about her nightmare and yet something stopped her. Instead, for reasons she couldn't identify if she had been asked to at that moment, she picked up her phone for something else.

Training ran late and none of the turtles had gotten the chance to check out their T-phones for messages. Just that morning Donatello had been able to get a t-phone together for Jennifer but they hadn't seen April or Casey to give them that number and regardless she had watched the turtles training and had too lost track of time.

Leonardo finally checked his messages. "It looks like we're on our own for dinner." He said, about to add guys to the end of the sentence but didn't. All of them still had a bit of adjustment to do with the fact they basically had a girl living with them full time now. "April called and cancelled going to Murikami's tonight, she's going to help Casey with something."

Mikey slumped on the couch. "Ah, what a bummer dude. I so wanted some Pizza Gyoza." He lamented like it was the end of the world.

"I'm sure we can find something here." Donnie said. He was kind of disappointed about it too especially since it meant April and Casey were alone.

Raph sat by Jennifer, which was something he had been doing a lot lately without realizing it and the blonde herself never complained about it, and took out his T-phone but frowned a moment later. "Uh, Leo. I have a text from Casey." He said.

"That's not unusual." Donnie reminded.

"No, but the unusual part is where he reminded me that he's going to a hockey game with his dad tonight but to text him if something comes up that we need his help with." Raphael informed them.

Jennifer and three turtles did a shocked double take at that announcement before the blonde asked, "Does she, you know, flake out often?" She asked.

"No." Donnie said as reached for his T-phone urgently. "I'm going to call Mr. O'Neill and see what he says about April's whereabouts."

The other three turtles and Jennifer waited, growing nervous with each second as they waited for Donnie to finish his conversation with April's father. He hung up and turned to the others. "Mr. O'Neill said that she told him she was going to meet us at Murikami's for dinner." He revealed.

"So we are going to Murikami's?" Mikey asked brightly.

Raph sighed annoyed. "We don't know what's going on dummy," The red masked turtle said in a very annoyed tone.

"Okay, so let's see if we have this straight." Leo said as he started to pace. "April told her dad she'd be with us at Murikami's. But she left a message with us saying she was going to help Casey with something, who in turn doesn't even know anything is even wrong here."

"Could she have just wanted time alone?" Jennifer asked.

"Why wouldn't she just come out and say that?" Leo questioned.

"We're missing something here." Donnie said as his voice started to get panicky.

"Calm down man." Raph said to his brother. "We don't know that anything is actually wrong here. Maybe she has a new friend she doesn't want to tell us about considering the last friend she brought down here ended in disaster."

"What happened?" Jennifer asked.

"Just before the Kraang invasion, April brought a girl she thought was her friend named Irma to the lair after being attacked by Footbots but was in reality a Kraang spy that called himself Kraang Subprime." Raph explained to the pretty blonde. "The Kraang discovering our lair was apparently the last piece of the puzzle they needed for their invasion and April's blamed herself for bringing the spy here."

"Still, wouldn't she tell Casey about a new friend?" Mikey asked. "Or even Jennifer, I mean the only reason she stays here is because she wants too." That was technically true as if she decided she really wanted to leave the turtles and Splinter knew they really had no right to keep her there. There was also the fact that April and Jennifer had grown pretty close in the last couple of weeks, only Raph could claim to have gotten as friendly with the blonde.

"We don't know that's the case either." Donnie said as he took a deep breath to calm himself. "We don't know anything and we should go looking for her."

"Donnie, we don't even know where to start." Raph reminded him. "Or if it's even really necessary."

"So let's decide what to do about dinner then." Mikey said.

The turtles each sighed in slight annoyance but they knew if they weren't going to try to perhaps uselessly track April then they might as well move on.

"Well why don't we go to Murikami's anyway?" Jennifer suggested. "I mean you can text me which way to go as you're roof jumping. You won't be that far away in case something happens."

"Or Raph could carry you." Mikey joked, drawing a major blush from Jennifer and a slight one from Raph, to which he got a pizza box thrown at him for his comment.

"It might be safer if you stay with us." Leo had to agree with Mikey despite ignoring the banter. "One of us can help you across the rooftops, plus we can probably make most of the journey through back alleys." He nodded. "Let's do it."

After Leonardo found out what Splinter wanted the four turtles and Jennifer left the sewers and went top side. They were able to get about halfway there through back alleys but construction forced them to head up to the rooftops. "Damn construction." Raph had commented but none the less didn't really object to holding Jennifer in his arms as they leapt up to the rooftops.

When they got to the roof the truth was Jennifer didn't really want to be let down again but didn't stop it from happening. She was able to make a few medium sized jumps on her own though, with only a bit of protest from her ribs, which were still very sore. For reasons unknown at the moment her right side was fine now despite the fact everyone was aware of the fact she shouldn't have been doing very well on either side.

"Are you sure you've never done any kind of ninja training?" Mikey asked as she made her fourth consecutive jump.

Jennifer nodded. "No ninja training whatsoever." She promised and then shrugged. "I however did train in gymnastics for almost ten years." She revealed. "I was good enough to go national but my dad forbid it when he started running his syndicate."

"Moron." Raph muttered. He hadn't met her father yet but he already hated him. No one could really blame Raph either based on what the blonde had told them about him.

They reached the edge of the roof and they were about to jump when Jennifer glanced down at the streets and gasped, "Wait."

"What's wrong?" Leo asked her.

"I think that's April, turning the corner there." Jennifer answered.

The turtles followed her gaze and sure enough she was right. They could just make out their red headed friend. "That is April." Donnie verified.

"What is she doing?" Mikey asked.

"I think she's heading for those warehouses over there, but I don't know why." Leo answered.

"I think we better find out." Donnie prompted.

"I agree." Leo said. "And we need to go fast." Raph took just a moment to take Jennifer into his arms before all four turtles leapt to keep up with April's brisk pace. A few minutes later they watched her enter a warehouse door, then nothing.

"Isn't this place supposed to be abandoned?" Raph questioned.

"Last I heard." Donnie answered and looked down. "I see a security camera over there, and it's active."

"So why didn't an alarm go off?" Leo wondered. He looked to his brothers. "We need to get in there."

"I'm going too." Jennifer decided.

"Too risky." Both Raph and Leo stated at the same time.

"No riskier than leaving me out here on my own with the gang war that seems to be brewing." Jennifer reminded the two turtles and then added in a softer voice, "Besides, April is my friend, if something is wrong I want to help her however I can."

Both turtles exchanged glances as if having a silent discussion. "Alright," Leo finally voiced. "You can come with us, just remember if I give you an order it has to be obeyed without question." His younger brothers rolled their eyes at Leo's subtle reference to his all-time favorite show Space Heroes.

"Drama queen." Mikey mocked him, not entirely realizing the situation could be dire.

"And you are to stay by me unless I say otherwise." Raphael added. Normally playing bodyguard would be the last thing he would ever want to do but the red masked turtle was slowly discovering he might be willing to consider doing things for Jennifer that he would never do for another person.

"That's fine with me." Jennifer promised the turtles. And that was that.

"We need to get rid of that camera." Leo said to Donnie.

"I got this." Mikey interjected. Before any of his older brothers could stop him he jumped off the roof, landed on the ground and picked up a large rock. He watched the camera for just a moment and then threw the rock, the arc making it crash right into the camera and smashing it.

As the other three turtles (Raph holding Jennifer in his arms again) landed Mikey smiled at them and whispered, "Booyakasha."

"Great job Mikey." Leo complimented as Raph put Jennifer down. "Now let's move out."

The five of them started toward the door April had gone into and the turtles were pleasantly surprised that Jennifer could move almost as silently as they could despite her lack of ninja training, though each of the turtles, sans Mikey, pretty much assumed that a decade of gymnastics could probably make a girl just as light on her feet.

Leo reached the door first and tried it. "It's locked." He announced.

"But April just went through that door like thirty seconds ago." Mikey said.

"Can you pick the lock?" Raph asked the resident genius.

"Probably." Donnie responded and knelt down to realize it was not only an electronic lock but something else. "Uh oh. Guys, this is Kraang tech."

"This is a Kraang lab?" Leo asked shocked. "Why would April willingly go into a Kraang lab by herself?"

"Only one way to find out." Raph decided and drew one of his sai before slamming it into the panel and twisting it hard. The door opened and Leo led the way in, Raph bringing up the rear so he could also keep an eye on Jennifer.

The Kraang lab corridor seemed even musty and even darker than normal. Even more of a surprise were the Kraang droid parts scattered as they continued along. "I don't suppose April could have done this?" Jennifer asked dubiously.

"Not a chance." Donnie answered. "None of the damage looks to have been done with a Tessen and all of this damage looks to be months old. If I had to guess I'd say this place fell apart about the time the Kraang invaded."

"The Mutanimals then?" Raph wondered.

"Maybe." Donnie said. "But none of these droids look like they've been physically damaged aside from the obvious being torn apart. We should still be seeing bite marks or mace marks or even beak marks."

Jennifer almost tripped over a droid arm, and as she looked down to see what caused it she noticed a small pad like object. She picked it up and her thumb rubbed against the screen and it activated. "Guys, its April." She said.

Donnie was the first to look. "No, it's not." He corrected the blonde. "But this girl does look very much like her."

"Another April derp?" Mike asked.

They heard metallic sounds and saw three Kraang droids coming down the corridor they were heading towards, but one thing became abundantly apparent to the turtles, conspicuous by their absence, the droids had no Kraang in their stomachs.

"Dude, that is weird." Mikey commented.

The Kraang droids turned and fired their lasers at them. The Turtles dodged and then Leo took out three shuriken's and tossed them at the Kraang droid's heads to disable them.

"No way April could have missed those." Raph commented.

"Where is she anyway?" Donnie wondered with some tension in his voice again.

They turned to the corridor past the Kraang droids and they saw April entering a room, what Donnie assumed was the command center. The Turtles and Jennifer stealthily followed and found her standing now in the center of the room which had been expanded.

"April O'Neill." Said a strong feminine voice. They saw a girl perhaps a year older than April come out of seemingly nowhere. Miscellaneous debris seemed to just get pushed out of her way with no rhyme or reason. They then realized that aside from the age difference and the fact her hair was more black than red, they might as well have been looking at a duplicate of April.

"An April derp." Mikey said.

The 'derp' closed her eyes and gave a small smile followed by a resigned sigh. "Despite my attempts to keep it quiet it seems somehow those reptiles that are in the Kraang file found their way here." She said and opened her eyes. "You might as well come out turtles."

The four turtles came out, though at a gesture from Raphael Jennifer stayed behind the door to watch. "The jig is up April derp." Mikey stated.

The 'derp' again laughed. "Yes, I read about the attack at the cloning facility the Kraang had clones of us in." She admitted. "But I am no derp, as you call it. I am much more than that."

"What do you want with April?" Donnie demanded to know.

"I want what's mine." The girl responded with a cruel smile. "Her powers, merely to enhance my own vast reserves."

"Your powers?" Leo questioned.

With a gesture of her hand the defunct command console was sent flying from its position straight at the Turtles. Luckily they dived out of the way, Raph and Mikey on one side with Donnie and Leo on the other side. Behind the door Jennifer flinched from the impact.

"What is wrong with April?" Raph asked.

Donnie could see a bit better from the new angle. "Guys, the derp has her in a trance of some sort." He said.

"I am no derp." She said. "From now until your time ends shortly, you may call me May."

"Let April out of that trance." Raphael demanded.

With a wave of her hand, May released April. The red head blinked in shock. "What…how did I get here?" April wondered. Then she saw her slightly older clone. "Who are you?"

"I am you, really your clone, but I'm better." May told her. "I am everything you could only hope to be, the ultimate personification of mental and psychic energies." She was now in April's face with a sadistic grin on her face. "But that doesn't mean I don't have use for you. You can either join me as a sister or face the same consequences as your mutant friends."

As if on cue doors opened to reveal almost as much Kraang droids as the Turtles had confronted on their first visit to their home of Dimension X, except they lacked Kraang in them.

April shook her head. "No. I will never join you; I will never betray my friends and I won't let you win." She stated.

May laughed humorlessly. "Then so be it." She declared and with just the narrowing of her eyes sent April sprawling across the room where she hit the wall hard. She then gestured for the Kraang droids to unleash their lasers on the turtles.

Through the commotion none of them heard Jennifer scream out, "April!" The blonde then glanced around and picked up one of the lasers. One thing that had never come up was her years playing laser tag with some of her school mates, and she only hoped that would come in handy now as she prepared to jump in to the fray.

The turtles began to wage into the seemingly endless army of empty Kraang droids and Jennifer emerged from the doorway and started to shoot at any droids that she thought were getting too close to her. She was glad to see April start to get up while May seemed to be enjoying the fight. She either didn't see Jennifer or didn't see her as a threat.

"These things are endless." Raph noted in frustration.

"These things are legion." May corrected the red masked turtle. "I can psychically reassemble them at least as fast as you can destroy them." She looked over to where April was standing and was now starting to use her abilities to toss the Kraang droids around, but she wasn't making the same headway May had when she had devastated and taken over the facility months ago. "If you had half the control of your powers that I do, you could end this April. But you can't." May gloated.

One of the lasers grazed April's arm and she fell to her knees. Then she looked up to see Jennifer make her way to her. The blonde kneeled down next to the red head. "Are you okay?" She asked.

April nodded solemnly. "I'll live, at least for another few minutes." She looked to the hopeless battle the turtles were fighting. "Look at what I've gotten you guys into."

Jennifer shook her head. "No, May controlled your actions. She made you cancel the plans you had with us but didn't count on us seeing you on our way to Murikami's." She said.

"Maybe, but May makes those Kraang droids faster than the turtles can defeat them and I'm not strong enough to wipe them out." April countered.

Some of the Kraang droids started to turn toward the girls but the turtles made their way over to protect the two girls.

"We have to get out of here." Mikey declared.

"How?" Raph snapped. "The doorway has been completely blocked by these empty tin cans."

"Stand your ground." Leo ordered. "We can find out a way to win. Failure is not an option."

"As I've pointed out, failure is always technically an option." Donnie said and looked toward the enclosing mass army. "A very realistic option in this case." He added meekly.

"The end is now." May declared as she floated above the Kraang droid army. "Unless April joins me now. This is the last chance. Do so and I will let them go free."

"You really want my power, for whatever reason." April mused as she looked at Jennifer and the turtles, ending her gaze on Donnie, with that gaze going sorrowful. She started to stand. "Then I ag…"

She was interrupted by Jennifer who grabbed April's hand and declared. "No, you can't." It seemed like a sweet but useless gesture but the instant the blonde's hand squeezed the red head's hand a massive shockwave seemed to emit from them. It bypassed the turtles entirely and slammed into the Kraang droids.

The droids were not just destroyed, they seemed to turn to dust all around them but it didn't stop there. As the droids were incinerated the wave grew until such a point as it reached May, bypassing even the force bubble she had used to endure the attempted attack of close to a hundred Kraang droids upon her escape and sent her flying backwards into one of the steel walls, which promptly fell upon her.

"Wow." Mikey stated. "A-maz-ing. To the millionth power."

Donnie was about to correct his little brother on the impossible math behind his statement when both girls seemed to lose their grip on each other, not to mention consciousness, and started to fall backwards. He quickly caught April while Raph rushed to catch Jennifer.

"What just happened?" Leo asked.

"I don't know." Donnie answered as he cradled April against him. "Without a way to read the energy currents I can't say for sure but I would think May was ten times more powerful than April is right now, but somehow she and Jennifer managed to reach power levels a hundred fold higher."

"How is that possible?" Leo asked.

"I think those samples I took from Jennifer might be able to provide answers." Donnie said.

"We should get back to the lair anyway." Raph said. "They need to rest."

Darkness finally seemed to release Jennifer with a "Mrow." and she opened her eyes to see Ice Cream Kitty looking down at her. She sat up and gently patted Ice Cream Kitty on the head. She had a bit of a headache herself. She saw April sitting up on the couch drinking some hot chocolate. And Raph was approaching her with a glass of hot chocolate.

He handed the drink to Jennifer. "How are you feeling?" Raph asked the blonde.

"Tired." Jennifer answered as she took the drink. "And a headache." She took a sip and looked around. "How did we get here to the lair?"

"You don't remember?" Raph asked. She shook her head.

"I don't remember either." April said. "The last thing I remember I was about to agree to May's demands, and then someone grabbed my hand."

"That was me." Jennifer said. "I was going to protest, but I don't remember anything after that."

"The two of you saved us." Mikey volunteered as he came in with some pizza.

"What? No way. How?" Both girls asked in unison.

"We're not entirely sure." Leo answered them. "Donnie says that when you two touched hands it seemed to unleash more power than May had, turning those droids to nothing and even defeating May."

"But my power is the result of the Kraang's experiments, no matter how inadvertently." April replied. "How could Jennifer tap into that, she's got no Kraang in her and she's a normal human."

At that moment Donnie stepped out of the lab, holding his lab top. "Jennifer is completely human." The purple masked turtle verified. "But she isn't normal."

"What do you mean Donnie?" Raph asked.

"I'm detecting several chemicals in her bloodstream, a lot of which I recognize from the notes I had seen that Falco wrote about Rockwell when he was working on the psychic thing." Donnie answered. "And several more I don't recognize."

"Are they dangerous to her?" Leo wanted to know.

"They've been in her system for so long I seriously doubt it." Donnie replied. "In fact it seems like it's been in her system for years, assuming these chemicals could be even be filtered out which I couldn't even guarantee, it might actually do her more harm than good."

They all realized what was not said but was heavily implied. It was Jennifer who finally voiced it, albeit softly. "Then my father did somehow experiment on me."

"These chemicals are also responsible for altering some of her genes, which accounts for her rapid healing." Donnie voiced. "And as far as I can tell with the right training she could develop psychic abilities that could match April's."

"That explains how the two of them together could beat May." Leo said. "She never knew Jennifer could do that anymore than we could, especially since the abilities she can have were given to her in a different way than her and April, and so she disregarded her presence until it was too late."

"I took Jennifer's hand the day she was brought here and we didn't have that kind of effect then." April noted.

"Circumstances were different." Donnie said. "You were recently using your abilities and all of our emotions were heightened during that conflict. I hypothesize those factors were what allowed Jennifer's latent abilities to tap into your active abilities and then amplify them both."

Jennifer looked to April and wordlessly the girls reached out and took each other's hands for a moment. Nothing happened.

"I bet Master Splinter can help you learn to tap into your abilities the way he helped me." April said.

Jennifer nodded. "I bet, but I think I need to let this sink in a bit first."

"I fully understand." April assured her.

It was decided at that time it was better to let April's father assume they met for dinner as planned but they all knew they had an interesting story to tell Casey. They also knew this was just the start of their mystery.

Mikey blinked in confusion. "Speaking of dinner, what are we doing about that?" Mikey asked.

The turtles moaned in exasperation, since Mikey had walked in with some pizza. "Mikey." They groaned.

In the Kraang lab's ruined command center the steel that had fallen on May during the final moments of the conflict was shattered into pieces and May stood up. Her movements were weak but the look in her eyes was fierce and promised revenge upon her newest enemies.

What does this revelation mean for Jennifer and the rest of the group? Does this make their coming battles easier or harder? If Jennifer's father did this to her, what else could he have in store? Stay tuned.


	7. The Arrival one: Yen

Disclaimer: Don't own TMNT; don't own the new villain who was originally in a TMNT comic, just own Jennifer.

"That all sounds so wicked. "Casey commented after the four Turtles and April had told him about the adventure he had missed the night before, when they had fought and nearly been defeated by May. If not for Jennifer having some hidden powers and being able to connect with April's powers they would have been. "Though that chick sounds really dangerous. Is she gone now?

"I don't know." April admitted as she reached for a slice of pizza from one of the boxes that Casey had brought down with him. "I don't get any sense of her."

"Which is kind of a contradiction." Donnie noted as he reached for his soda. "On one hand May is strong enough that April could easily detect her in her sleep if she wanted to, but on the other hand May is powerful enough to block any attempts April wanted to make at it anyway."

"Blah, blah, science, blah." Mikey mimicked as he reached for two more slices of pizza. The mockery drew a look of annoyance from the purple masked turtle.

"I think right now we have other matters to focus on anyway." Leo said. "Even if she is still alive she's probably going to need to recover." He gave each of his brothers and their three human allies serious looks one at a time. "Mean time we have at least two gangs gearing up for what looks to be war and they don't need any recovery time."

"So then what's our next step fearless leader?" Raph asked as he took another slice of pizza for himself. Jennifer sat next to him, munching on her own slice of pizza. She had been rather quiet since the story started. It made sense as that lead to some interesting and freaky revelations for her.

"I don't know." Leo admitted. "So far the Foot seem to be almost as mystified as we are about this. And we still don't know who the head of the Goldens are."

"A path will present itself." Splinter assured his students as he used a chopstick to get a piece of sushi, which Casey had picked up at his request rather than another night of pizza. "We must have patience.

April flinched and Donnie looked at her. "April, are you okay?" He asked her.

"Piece of pepperoni too spicy Red?" Casey inquired.

April shook her head. "No…something feels…close. It seems to be heading for the lair." She revealed.

"Who else knows where you guys…where we live?" Jennifer asked. She was still adjusting to the idea that this was the closest she had to a home in a long time.

"The Mutanimals, but I doubt they would really cause that kind of reaction." Raph answered.

Leo had a realization. "The Kraang, They found the lair once. Maybe they're coming back for another round." He stated.

"I guess." April said. "But it doesn't feel like the Kraang, and rather I like it or not I have a really good sense of them."

"It does not matter what it is." Splinter stated as he rose and retrieved his cane. "Arm yourselves and prepare for battle. If something does show up we have to be ready."

"Jennifer, you better head into the dojo. You'll be safest there." Raph said to the young blonde.

Jennifer wanted to help her friends but she knew right now she was in the way. It made her feel rather bad, truth be told. "Okay." She agreed and started toward the dojo.

Casey had slipped on his mask and reached for the metal bat that Splinter had recently enchanted to protect him from the effects of the time slowing smoke bomb just in case it was the Golden's rather than the Kraang. He happened to glance up and let out a, "Wow, holy moly."

The Turtles, Splinter, and April looked up and saw black clad ninjas. They could see that their skin was a really dark green and they had red eyes. Some of them had blades in place of their hands, others hand claws in place of their fingers and some had wings sprouting from their back. None of the creatures shared the same unique feature however.

"Dark Oni's." Splinter murmured in surprise.

"Bless you." Mikey responded and received a smack in the back of the head from Raphael for the joke.

"What are those?" April asked.

"Dark Oni." Splinter repeated. "They were thought to be a race of demons that lived in the shadows. Japanese legend stated them as eaters of children's souls. I did not realize there was more than kind of them though."

"I'm seeing at least four kinds." Raph noted. "But how did they find us?"

"They travel in shadows, dude." Mikey replied as if that answered everything.

Splinter had to admit that in this case it very well might.

The Dark Oni flooded into the lair. There numbers weren't quiet as overwhelming as the Kraang droids that May had at her disposal at the decimated laboratory but it was still not looking good.

"How did we go from mutants and robots to ghosts and demons?" Donnie wondered as he used his bo staff to block a claw attack and then brought it around in quick succession into the clawed oni's stomach.

"Bad luck?" Mikey suggested. He dodged a bladed oni's attack, landed on his back and did a leg sweep to knock the thing onto the ground.

"Would you stand still?" April asked uselessly after a winged oni dodged her Tessen attack.

"I got it Red." Casey stated as he took a hockey puck from his bag, tossed it into the air and hit it with the bat. Being a puck rather than a baseball the hit was a bit awkward but worked well enough that it slammed into the oni's chest and it fell to the ground.

"Can these things even be defeated?" Raph asked as he blocked a clawed oni's attack, used the momentum to knock its arms back and then slammed his fists into his opponent's chest.

"I do not know." Splinter answered truthfully as he used his walking stick to block a sword attack from a bladed oni and then used his tail to trip it up, and then swung at the oni with a solid hit that sent the thing flying and would have made Casey or any baseball fan proud. "No one has ever been recorded to have fought them and live to tell about it. Most information is second hand."

"Then I guess we get to be the first." Leo stated as he jumped on the shoulders of a regular oni, leapt off of him and brought his feet directly into the chest of a winged oni in the air. He angled his body so that he landed on the winged creature.

April dodged a bladed oni's slashing attack and brought her fist and Tessen up against the black clad demon and sent it back, though it rose quickly.

"These guys are as well trained as that white ninja ghost thing." Donnie noted. "These guys are a real pain."

"Can't be that well trained." Raph said jokingly. "Casey's handling himself well against them."

"Forget that man." Casey commented as he dodged a bladed oni and then slammed the metal bat into the things head. "Their training is nothing compared to being the awesomeness of Casey Jones."

Donnie placed one end of staff on the ground and then used it as leverage to get up higher and kick a winged oni that was diving straight at him. "Awesomeness or not, don't underestimate them Jones." He pointed out. "For that matter, no one should do that."

"Sage advice, Donatello." Splinter commented as he jumped past one oni, slammed into a winged oni only to turn around and knock out the one he had jumped past.

Jennifer watched from behind the tree in the dojo. She was glad her friends were holding their own rather well but still wished she could help out. It was fortunate that none of these oni's seemed to be aware of her location. Or perhaps they just didn't care as she didn't really present them with a threat.

Some of the regular black clad oni stepped back and from out of nowhere pulled shuriken's out and started to toss them at the turtles. "Wow, incoming." Donnie noted loudly.

"Dude, that is not cool." Casey noted as he used his metal bat to start knocking some of them away from striking him.

Mikey dodged a few of the shuriken's and turned his nunchuck into his Kusarigama and threw the sickle chained end at some of the bladed oni's but a winged one intercepted it, took the chain and tossed the orange clad turtle by the chain into the wall closest to the dojo. Mikey let out a yelp and fell to the ground.

"Nobody beats up on Mikey but me!" Raph exclaimed as he jumped up from the couch and leapt at the winged oni, stabbing his sais into the wings and causing it to crash down on the ground, also running into a few bladed oni's. Jennifer thought that was really sweet in a sort of weird way.

"Mikey!" Leo shouted even as he blocked two bladed oni's. "Mikey, dude. You have to get up." When Mikey didn't do so he realized he must have been knocked unconscious. "Someone get to Mikey." The blue masked turtle ordered.

Both April and Casey tried too but were blocked by four bladed oni's. "We're stuck here." Casey called out.

Raph tried but was blocked by a barrage of shuriken's from some of the regular clad oni's. "Damn it." He cursed.

Leo and Donnie were blocked off by bladed oni's and clawed oni's. Splinter was trying to get to his youngest son as well but the winged oni's kept getting in his way too.

Jennifer realized only one person was close to Mikey. Her. She looked around for anything she could use, and saw that a small wooden pole, about half the size of Donnie's bo staff that Splinter had called a dowel, had been left out. She picked it up and ran over to Mikey. She was glad to see he was breathing but there was a slight bump on the back of his head.

Raph glanced over and for a second was annoyed that Jennifer was putting herself in harm's way again but let it go since she was trying to check on Mikey. Then he noticed a bladed oni had noticed her and was running toward her. "Jennifer! Look out!" The red masked turtle shouted.

Jennifer looked up and saw the bladed oni coming. She raised the dowel as she had seen the turtles raise their weapons in practice and blocked the incoming attack. She shot her leg out and was able to deliver a decently strong kick to his midsection. Then Leo threw a shuriken at the back of his head and it fell to the ground. "Thanks, Leo." Jennifer called out.

"Anytime." Leo assured her. "Your family after all."

"Just don't get too distracted." Mikey said fuzzily as he woke up. He rubbed the back of his head. "Anyone get the license number of that bus?"

"It might as well have been a plane." Jennifer joked with him lightly. "Can you stand? Can you still fight?"

Mikey nodded. "Yeah, thanks." He reached for his weapon and stood up. "You should get back to the dojo though."

"No." Raph said. "You need to keep her safe. She's been seen now and some are on their way." As if to emphasize Raph's point some of the regular clad oni that had been throwing shuriken were now coming toward them. He also figured right now Jennifer might be an asset to Mikey. Being conscious wasn't quite the same thing as being aware.

"I don't know how much longer we can do this." April admitted reluctantly. "These things seem to be going on forever, even if they're not endless."

"Do demons even sleep?" Casey wondered idly.

Raph felt exactly the same way his human companions did. He wasn't sure what to do either. "This is getting ridiculous." He muttered.

One of the bladed dark oni's chopped the dowel in half. "Damn." She muttered. It then kicked her hard into the dojo. She landed with a thud that probably would have disturbed Raph if he had heard or seen it. She stood up, slightly out of breath since her ribs were still recovering a little. She saw the bladed dark oni coming toward her. Then in the corner she noticed a bo staff, and she remembered it was the one April and Casey had appropriated from the Golden's in their first fight. She reached for it and held it somewhat awkwardly. "Stay away." She said, more out of habit than any expectation for effectiveness.

Sure enough it ignored her and advanced closer. She thrust one end of the staff at the Dark Oni and to her surprise when it connected with the black clad demon it puffed out of existence.

Mikey saw that. "How'd you do that?" he asked her.

"I don't…" Jennifer started but then suddenly she had an idea. Unlike the turtles enchanted weapons, where the enchantment had to be activated, this weapon was permanently set like that. "Mikey, turn the enchantment on your nunchuck on." She said.

Mikey looked confused. "Um, okay. Let's try and be glowy." He decided and did so. Then he swung his nunchuck at an approaching regular dark oni. To his surprise what he saw Jennifer did was repeated here, the dark oni puffing out. "Dude."

Leo saw that. "The enchantment." He realized. "Good job Mikey!"

"Thank Jennifer." Mikey told his oldest brother.

"Later then." Leo said since he couldn't see her in the dojo. "Guys, activate the weapon enchantments and let's finish this." He followed his own orders and activated the enchantments on his katana and started to slice through the oni's like he had the last few times he had fought Footbots.

"I'm liking this." Raph said with a gleeful smile and then his sais started to glow. He too then started to cut through the oni's.

"Awesome." Donnie agreed and did the same thing, smacking them out of the way with his now enchanted staff.

"Rad." Casey took his enchanted bat and started hitting his own home runs.

April took out her second Tessen and then activated the enchantment on her weapons and started to cut through them. "This is more like it." She stated.

The remaining demon oni moved toward the turnstile, and then from the shadows stepped a man who was as tall as an average basketball player. He wore an old style Japanese hat and the bottoms of the black ninja uniform but was shirtless. "Well done." He said in a strong and gravelly voice.

The Turtles gathered together with April, Casey, and Splinter. Jennifer was only a step behind and she stood just behind Raphael, instinctively placing her hands on his shell as if trying to be protected. Raph would have had no problem with that except he didn't notice. He, like his family, was set on the intruder.

"Who the heck are you?" Leo wanted to know, pointing one of his katana in his general direction. "Why did you attack us? How did you find us?"

"You may call me Yen." The man answered. "This attack as you call it was just a test." Everyone noticed he didn't answer how he had found the lair and got the idea he had no intention of answering it either.

"A test?" Raph questioned hotly as he thought about Mikey getting tossed by one of the winged oni. About the bladed one that would have torn into Jennifer if she hadn't had the dowel, never mind the fact he never saw the oni that had given the blonde a ferocious kick. "I'll test you, you over muscled…" His threat was interrupted when one of Jennifer's hands moved to his arm.

"Why test us?" Splinter demanded harshly.

"Because I needed to get an idea of the one element in this war that I've never seen before." Yen answered simply. "Surely you realize that a gang war is brewing."

"And you're running around with demons." Leo stated flatly.

Yen laughed. "I am not the only one." He gestured to the onis. "These low level demons are nothing compared to the demons our opponent's will be operating with."

"Why are you even telling us this if we're supposed to be your opponents?" April wondered.

"The lesser of two evils." Yen explained. "Or perhaps more accurately the lesser of all evils. You see, I am aware that you will only fight this war to protect the people of this city. The rest of our adversaries fight for dominance."

"Yourself included." Casey snapped.

Yen shrugged. "My agendas don't really match what you consider dominance." He said enigmatically. "But I don't need the Foot to become any more dominant than they already are and I sure don't need my particular opponent getting that kind of position."

"Why's that?" Donnie asked.

Yen shrugged, clearly having no intention of revealing that. "The point here is that you are the ones who I would prefer to prevail, but if you cause me too many problems in this war then you will fall just as quickly as the others."

"You mentioned other demons." Jennifer said. "But my father doesn't have any demons around."

Yen chuckled. "The daughter." He noted. "How clueless you are little girl."

"Watch it." Raph barked.

"No." Jennifer said to him. "He's right." She after all didn't know her father had experimented on her, nor for how long. That meant he could have held other secrets from her, including a demon.

"Your father indeed has a demon adding to his work." Yen told the blonde directly. No trace of malice or victory, just straight fact. "Our other opponent has a demon as his sponsor."

"What's the difference?" Mikey wondered.

"My father has a demon just working with him." Jennifer told the orange masked turtle. "Whoever this other person is has every resource at his disposal because of the demon and without that this person wouldn't be part of the war."

"Who are these demons?" Splinter asked.

"If I knew that one I would not be here rat." Yen answered him. "I would have instead dealt with them personally."

"Cocky, aren't you?" Casey questioned.

Yen laughed again. "An interesting term coming from you and your little band of misfits." He replied and then shrugged. "I have given you everything I prefer to reveal to you. Use it how you like, or don't. It's not my concern. Just know that if you get on my bad side then you will not live to regret it." With that he snapped his fingers and he vanished, along with his oni.

"That was weird." Casey noted.

"Do we trust him sensei?" Donnie questioned as he put his bo staff down.

"I am not sure we should trust him." Splinter answered. "But some of his words should be heeded."

"He may not be lying about the demons." Leo said as he sheathed his katana blades. "Remember the red eyes I thought I saw when we investigated the alley where we rescued Jennifer."

The blonde sat down on the couch and took a deep breath. Raph sat beside her. "Are you okay?" He asked.

She nodded. "Yeah, a little winded is all. I've never fought before now." She said.

"Great job on coming up with a way to turn the tide against the Oni by the way." Leo said to her.

"It was a lucky break, but thanks." Jennifer said.

"Again, don't sell yourself short." April reminded her friend. "Whatever you want to call it, you were the one who found the solution."

"At least the pizza isn't ruined." Mikey noted happily.

Raph shook his head.

"If any of them have demons involved in this, then our problems are far bigger than it seems." Splinter informed them. "The trouble we had with the Oni's are nothing compared to what we might face from higher level demons."

Casey shook his head. "Demons, ghosts, I mean what is this, the Twilight Zone?" He wondered.

"Rest up and relax now." Splinter advised them. "Things are most likely going to go downhill from here."

Can they trust this new arrival? What kind of trouble can the turtles expect? Who else could be showing up? Find out in the second part.


	8. The Arrival two: Chein Kahn

Disclaimer: Don't own TMNT, just Jennifer. Starting to think I need some other OC's lol. This villain was originally in Archie TMNT, just modified for 2012 continuity.

Leonardo, Donatello, and Raphael were roof jumping. Michelangelo and Casey Jones were using a skateboard and roller blades respectively. All five were on patrol for anything. The threat of the Foot clan was always there but now they had the Goldens to worry about and no one was confident that trusting the new arrival Yen's words meant the man himself could be trusted, so they were looking out for Dark Oni as well. And at least in theory the Purple Dragons should have been considered too.

"This has gone rather well so far." Donnie noted energetically.

"Speak for yourself." Raph replied to his brother. "I was hoping to kick some serious evil tonight."

"Yeah, got to top the oni brawl somehow." Casey added.

"Some of us wouldn't mind the quiet night before all of this gets out of hand." Mikey said.

"We'll give it another hour and then we'll call it." Leo told them.

Meanwhile in the lair Splinter was teaching April some moves while Jennifer watched the two of them. Afterwards they were going to help Jennifer start to hone her new psychic powers. It was decided it needed to be a combined effort since April had the similar powers but the rat master was the expert at teaching things such as patience and concentration. Helping the blonde was the only reason April hadn't insisted on going on patrol with the guys, that and the looming possibility that someone else could try to attack the lair as Yen had.

"You are doing very well April." Splinter complimented the red head.

"Thank you sensei." The red head replied with a smile. "I guess I've had to learn and grow quicker than most kunoichi or ninjas have to."

"Indeed you have." Splinter agreed. "Not many of them are frequent targets of the Kraang or associated with those who have an evil and deadly ninja clan seeking their end."

"Yay for you April." Jennifer joked gently with her.

April laughed a little. "Yeah, witness my joy." She replied back.

"It is now your turn as well Jennifer." Splinter said to the blonde. "Come join us as we meditate. Focusing your mind will help you to be able to focus your innate abilities."

"Yes, sensei." Jennifer said as she joined the two of them where they sat down crossed legged and placed their hands above their knees.

"Take a deep breath." Splinter instructed both girls. "Clear your minds of any thoughts and just listen to your surroundings."

April remembered the last time she had done something like that she had heard the Kraang communication orb that was actually still stashed in Donnie's lab as far as she knew. Then from a slight throat clearing from Splinter she realized her mind was not being cleared and she tried again.

In the distance the guys could hear the sounds of Footbots and while they were not coming in their direction that didn't mean they hadn't found something worth worrying about now.

"Should we follow them?" Donnie asked.

Leo nodded. "Yes, but we need to be quiet about it. Full ninja stealth mode." He answered.

"Dude, we get it." Mikey said.

"Last time that was said Donnie's T-phone went off in the Kraang's underwater lab." Raph reminded him.

"April's not likely being chased this time." Donnie retorted.

"Guys." Leo whispered harshly. "Full. Ninja. Stealth. Mode."

The guys followed the Footbots a few blocks and found them landing in a deserted parking lot with another group of Footbots and the formerly famous martial artist and apprentice to the Shredder, the skeletal dog mutant Chris Bradford better known as Rahzar.

"What are they doing here?" Leo wondered.

"Maybe Rahzar smelled a bone." Mikey suggested, to which Raph smacked him in the back of the head.

"Come out wherever you are." Bradford chanted as they were looking around.

"Does he smell us?" Casey wondered.

Donnie shook his head. "I don't think so; he's not looking in our direction. He's looking at the storefronts." The purple masked turtle answered.

From the alley in between a drug store and a print shop came Goldens, a few white ninjas, and another guy in a gold mask. "I see the dog found us." The gold masked guy noted, seemingly amused.

"I did." Rahzar agreed. "And it was easy enough since you're not human. Why don't you show us your face, cur?"

The man laughed. "This city is so full of mutants that it really shouldn't matter." He agreed, removing the gold mask to reveal that he had the face of a bulldog, cheeks slightly puffy as befits the breed but with the cruel eyes that most also associate with the breed. "You may call me Chein Khan."

"I would have called him Pitbully." Mikey said to his brothers. "I mean he looks like a pit bull and he acts like a bully so,"

"We get it." Raph snapped. "Now shush."

"What does Chein Khan even mean?" Casey asked.

"It's Japanese for Dog King." Donnie answered.

"Guys." Leo hissed quietly.

Rahzar laughed. "You can call yourself whatever you wish. It won't matter."

"You intend to fight me here?" Chein Khan asked.

"Not just you." Rahzar responded. "You're not the only thing I smell, but the other is more cold blooded."

"Uh oh." Donnie said as they turned to see some of the Footbots were now behind them too.

Chein Khan looked up. "Mutant turtles, now I've seen everything." He decided.

"Oh, and how did you come to be dog boy?" Raph asked.

"Where did you get mutated anyway?" Rahzar questioned.

"Mutated?" Chein Khan questioned, seemingly confused.

"That's what made us." Mikey said. "Rahzar even got double mutated." The orange masked turtle snickered a bit.

Rahzar growled. "Enough talk." He stated and the Footbots started to attack, the ones on the roof going after Casey and the turtles while the ones on the ground started their attack on Chein Khan and the Goldens.

"Time for some fun." Casey stated as he brought his now special metal bat down on the head of one of the Footbots. "No enchantments required."

Raphael saw Rahzar and Chein Khan going at it and decided that the bad guys shouldn't be the only ones to be leaving impressions on each other, so he started off the roof stopping only long enough to use his sais to stab a Footbot in what would be the stomach and the head before flipping it off the roof and then going down himself. "Can't let you two have all the fun." He commented as he kicked Rahzar to the side.

"I'll tear you both to shreds." Rahzar promised.

"You're both more than welcome to try." Chein Khan gloated.

"These guys are just getting too easy." Mikey noted as he used a spinning kick and nunchuck combo to knock a Footbot off the roof.

"Tell me about it." Donnie agreed as he activated the secret switch that extended the single edged blade from the end of his bo staff, basically turning it into a Naginata. "But let's not lose focus here or we might regret it."

"More than you realize." Casey said as they saw some of the Goldens and a white ninja joining them on the rooftop. "It's starting to get a little bit crowded up here."

"I only wish that white ninja was as easy to deal with." Mikey added with a small gulp.

"At least now we know what we have to do." Leo noted as he started toward the white ninja that had joined them on the roof, kind of wanting to get some payback against the one that had taken him to the limit since he hadn't know the weakness at the time.

"Guys." Casey said as he pointed to one of the Golden's. He held up a smoke bomb and was getting ready to drop it. "I think it's time to be enchanted."

Each of the three turtles agreed and followed suit just as the bomb struck the ground. Donnie noted with some satisfaction that the Footbots weren't slowed down in the least, not so much because he wanted them to survive but because he was proven right about his hypothesis that their systems would find a way to compensate for it. The next thing he wondered is if it would affect the oni's.

Both girls opened their eyes and Jennifer even stood up.

"What is wrong?" Splinter asked them.

"I don't know." April admitted.

"It feels like…if I had to guess I'd say the guys are in trouble." Jennifer said, her thoughts going to Raph.

"Unfortunately if that is true there is nothing we can do for them." Splinter reminded the two girls gently. "We do not even know where they are."

"Couldn't that be an exercise we could try?" April asked.

Splinter contemplated that for a moment. In truth at the moment no they couldn't. But the rat master conceded that would be an interesting thing for them to try, but both girls would have to hone their skills more in order to do so, and that was if they were to work together to do it. "At the moment I do not believe so, but I will conduct some research into it to determine the best way for us to do that. It may come in handy in the future." He answered.

Both girls were a bit excited at the prospect of learning something like that, but it didn't help them now.

Splinter rose. "I believe that should be all for today." He told the girls. "I would advise against trying to find the boys but feel free to do what you need to in order to prepare for their return."

It was a game of give and take. Chein Khan was a skilled warrior, Raph had to give the bulldog that much. All three of them seemed to be on equal footing. Raph would block a swipe from Rahzar as Rahzar would elude the sword strike Chein Khan delivered. Chein Khan would block a strike from Raph as the red masked turtle jumped over Rahzar.

The white ninja blocked Leo's initial attack, but the blue masked turtle was able to dodge the kick his adversary attempted to deliver. The white ninja then attempted to bring his sword down on him and Leo blocked it with both of his katana. He then slid to the side and as the white ninja turned to follow Leo thrust one of his glowing katana into what should have been the eyes of his adversary who promptly vanished, leaving the white garment behind. "Yes." Leo whispered.

Despite clashing with Raph and Rahzar Chein Khan was keeping an eye on the fight his forces were engaged in and was not happy. "How is it my forces are losing to a bunch of robots, a human and three mutant turtles?" He growled angrily.

Rahzar laughed. "We've been trying to figure out how we keep losing to four turtles and their miscellaneous little friends for a while now." He said.

"It's because we're better than all of you clowns." Raph answered smugly.

Both dog mutants growled at him and tried to double team Raph but the red masked turtle flipped up over them and delivered kicks to the back of both their heads.

The rooftop became clear of both active Footbots and Golden's. That left Casey and the three turtles to jump down to the parking lot and head toward Raphael and the two villainous head honchos, though there were still some minions to deal with on the way.

"You boys are running out of leash here." Raph joked with a grin. "Soon it won't be a triple threat."

"I can beat all of you myself." Chein Khan threatened.

"So can I." Rahzar added.

Raph laughed a bit. "Friendly tip, don't write checks your mouth can't cash doggies." He said.

"Yeah, and don't write up a charge that your card can't cover." Mikey added as they came up.

"I'm not sure that's a saying Mikey." Donnie said.

Both dog mutants did seem slightly aggravated at the turn of events. Even together their chance of taking on all five of the good guys was less than ideal.

"You might as well just lower your weapon, Chein Khan, and both of you surrender right now." Leonardo stated.

Raphael was about to ask why they should even leave them still standing when a black fog suddenly seemed to envelope the area. From in front of one of the store fronts the red eyes that Leo thought he had seen in the alley where they had rescued Jennifer were now staring out at them. There was a deep sinister laugh that set Rahzar, Casey, and the turtle's nerves on edge. To make matters more creeptastic black hands emerged from the black fog and cloaked Chein Khan. Then the black fog vanished and the mutant bull dog was gone.

"What the hell just happened?" Raphael asked, anger masking his surprise and even a little bit of fear.

"Dude, what was that?" Mikey asked in a slightly trembly voice. He had very little compunction about showing his fear.

"Donnie, explanation?" Leo asked his smartest brother as even he had been a bit set on edge.

"Um…" Donnie stuttered and seemed to think just a minute before he finally went with. "I can't."

"Where did Rahzar go?" Casey asked, trying to focus on something other than how much that had creeped him out.

Raphael glanced around and just barely noticed Rahzar on the rooftops running away. "He's hightailing it." He answered.

"I know how he feels right now." Mikey commented.

"Again, what the hell just happened?" Raph demanded.

"You just met your first high level demon." Said a voice. They turned to see Yen with a couple of his Dark Oni, the regular kind. "That was a demon known as Noi Tai Dar, his sponsor and a great demon lord."

"You said you didn't know any of the demons." Leo remembered.

"I exaggerated." Yen admitted. "What you just saw is the extent of what Noi Tai Dar can do. He's trapped in the underworld and unable to manifest in this world without help from someone on this side."

"Chein Khan." Donnie guessed.

"Yes." Yen confirmed. "The barrier is strong enough that there is no way for me to reach him either. The only way I can stop Noi Tai Dar from reaching this world is to stop his forces here, including my brother."

"Wait." Casey said. "Chein Khan is your brother."

Again Yen nodded. "My younger brother."

Each turtle wondered how that happened but then Yen started to turn away, ending any attempt at digging in deeper to that story. "I suggest you watch yourselves." He repeated, subtly indicating that he was warning them away from interfering with his own efforts as well being careful of his brother and the demon that was sponsoring him. In moments he and his Dark Oni vanished.

"That's just great." Raph stated. "Now we have feuding brothers on top of everything."

"I think we have an idea that's like." Mikey declared and then ran as Raph started to after him.

"Enough you two." Leo said. "I think we need to tell Splinter about this. I think he'll agree the playing field has definitely changed but we need to see what he advises from there."

April watched Jennifer as she took out a few pizzas for when the guys returned. "I still think that was a really creepy feeling." She said. "And it only seemed to get worse a few minutes ago."

"I don't understand how this even works." Jennifer admitted as she was setting them on the table. "I mean your abilities were a byproduct of the Kraang's experiments and mine are…" She drifted off as the blonde girl realized she didn't actually have any idea how that happened.

"And you're not even sure what happened to give you yours." April finished for her friend anyway. "I thought a little about this and I'm thinking that the circumstances that gave us our powers aren't important. What matters is that they're basically the same thing."

"I guess you're right." Jennifer said. "It's the end that really matters I guess." She reached over for the pizza cutter. "Still, at least you know how your powers came about. I'd like to know how mine came about." She bit her lip a little.

"You want to know if there's something else your father did to you." April added.

Jennifer nodded. "Yeah." She admitted softly. "What else could he have done besides this psychic ability and apparently a form of quick healing."

"I get that." April reassured her. "I mean, the psychic abilities are kind of neat but it comes with other things too. I mean I'm immune to mutagen and I can hear their stuff. Once I heard a Kraang communication orb hidden in the sewers and another time when we were in TCRI I overheard some of Kraang Prime's invasion plans that he was giving to the other Kraang."

"Kraang Prime?" Jennifer asked.

April realized she had never seen that. Really, Jennifer had yet to see a Kraang up close. "Yeah, it's like the others that the guys described except it's bigger and somehow knows how to speak proper English." She answered.

"Hey, I smell pizza!" They heard Mikey exclaim. They came out of the kitchen to see Casey and the turtles moving past the turnstiles into the lair.

"They smell a lot better than the one you made Mikey." Leo noted with some delight.

"Jennifer just made a few pizzas." April explained as she came over to them, briefly placing one hand on Casey's arm and the other hand on Donnie's arm.

"Hey, she's a keeper." Mikey teased his red masked brother. He would have punched him in the arm but the blonde they were just talking about a moment ago came over and hugged Raphael briefly.

"April and I both felt something." Jennifer said after she pulled back. "What happened?"

"We met a demon." Casey told them. "A big one."

"Sort of anyway." Leo emphasized. "It was just red eyes and black hands, along with black fog."

"And he showed up to help his sponsor, a mutant bulldog named Chein Khan." Donnie added.

"Who just happens to be Yen's younger brother." Mikey added, wanting desperately to get to the pizza Jennifer had made.

"April, Casey, help me get the pizzas out." Jennifer requested her two human friends.

"Works for Casey Jones." Casey decided as he dropped his bag of sporting good weapons on the floor and pulled up his hockey mask. He and April followed her.

"It seems that you ran into more than you bargained for, again." They heard Splinter say from the entrance of the dojo. "What was the demons name?"

"Mew Tie Dye." Mikey tried to supply helpfully.

"That's not what it was shell brain." Donnie scolded his youngest brother.

Leo ignored his two brothers. "Yen said his name was Noi Tai Dar." He answered his sensei.

Splinter seemed grim. "I wish I knew anything about that demon." He admitted. "Just that he has been trapped in the underworld for perhaps centuries."

"Well we know he's behind the Goldens." Raph said. "We also know that the demon can't come into our world unless he's helped out by Khannie and whatever he needs to make it happen. It's a small start I guess."

"We'll just have to figure out how to deal with him." Leo stated. "We can't back out of this now, innocents are still in danger and we can't ignore that."

"Leonardo is correct." Splinter said. "Just remember, sometimes the best way to draw the line is to refuse the marker when it is offered to for the purpose of drawing."

"Huh?" Mikey asked.

"I think Master Splinter means that the best way to deal with the threat of that demon is to prevent him from ever coming into our world in the first place." Jennifer replied as the three humans came in with the pizzas and set them down.

"Correct." Splinter confirmed.

They all sat down to eat the pizza, each turtle agreeing that Jennifer did indeed to a good job cooking. "I might even let you start doing all the cooking." Mikey joked.

"Hey, this can't get any worse though, right?" Casey asked referring to the current situation. That was met with incredulous stares from the others.

How can the turtles stop their newest adversary from freeing his demon sponsor? Is that all part of the gang war? The last adversary will show up next.


	9. The Arrival three: Fulcanelli

Disclaimer: Don't own TMNT, just own Jennifer though the number of characters I own here may very well be changing soon. Also remember I would appreciate reviews and any suggestions on what you would like to see.

"As I once told your friends, my restaurant was never very popular until I invented these for them." Mr. Murakami said to April, Casey and Jennifer as he set a thing of Pizza Gyoza in front of them while the turtles themselves were getting ready to compete for a piece themselves.

"I can see why." Jennifer said to him as she used a chopstick to take a gyoza, clumsily but successfully and moved to eat it. "These are great." She added before eating it.

"Totally." Casey agreed.

April took one of them and turned to the turtles. "Ready?" She asked them.

"Let's do it." Raph said. "Bring it bros."

"I'm ready." Mikey promised.

"And go." April announced as she tossed it into the air.

Mikey made a flying leap for it but was tackled down by Raph. Leo tried to catch it with his katana and Donatello responded by using his bo staff to knock it off course, but was tripped by Raph when he tried to go for it. Leo moved to for it but Mikey leapt onto his shell, back flipped over him and caught it in his mouth, landing as he chewed and then with a satisfied smile said, "How about them back flips bros?"

"Alright guys, knock it off." Jennifer said to them. "Let's actually eat like a civilized family."

"Yeah, right." Casey commented with a grin and laugh.

As Donnie came to sit by April, Raph walked by and punched Casey in the arm before sitting next to Jennifer. Leo and Mikey sat on Casey's other side as Mr. Murakami set down some more pizza gyoza's for the turtles

"It's so weird to hear on the news about all of those people that are disappearing." April noted as she took a piece of her own pizza gyoza. She also had some egg drop soup on her left that she would eat from as well.

"Think it's because of the g…" Casey started to ask but got elbowed by Raph. The last thing they wanted to reveal was the knowledge that a gang war could be starting since that could cause some public panic in the wrong hands. "You know." He said enigmatically, at least to Mr. Murakami.

"I don't see what that would accomplish." Mikey noted with a shrug, then started to dig into his pizza gyoza.

"In this case Mikey is right." Donnie agreed. "There is no reason for any of them to be abducting people that have nothing to do with them. So far the only danger would be second hand."

"It might be something else then." Leo noted.

"But this could be completely unrelated. It certainly could be nothing that should concern us." Jennifer pointed out. "I mean the police force has to be good for something after all."

"She's got a point." Raph said. "I mean I'd love to be out there busting down every bad guy from the ninja assassin to the murderer to the pathetic bank robbers and I'll certainly bring the smack down when I can, but even I've come to realize that just isn't realistic." He reached for his glass of soda.

April had to stop herself from giggling. Whether anyone realized it or not some of this sudden change of heart from the red masked turtle was being influenced simply by the presence of their new young blonde friend.

"Very true." Donnie agreed. "But how much seems to happen in this city that doesn't end up involving us in some way?"

"Not a lot." April answered.

No one could disagree with that one. Some more small talk ensued as they ate and then after paying and picking something up to take home for Splinter, not to mention some extra for Mikey who always seemed to be eating, they started to head for the lair where they were going to watch a movie before April and Casey headed home.

They had only walked a few blocks when April tensed. "Guys, we're not alone and we're being followed." She informed them.

The turtles each looked around anxiously. "Is it the Purple Dragons? The Foot?" Casey asked April.

"Chein Kahn?" Leo guessed.

"Yen?" Raph questioned.

Mikey paused a moment in consideration. "Boy, we have a lot of enemies." He realized. The statement of the obvious drew sighs of annoyance from his older brothers.

"I'm thinking someone else." Casey stated as three men stepped from the alley. All three were muscular, the man on the left was Hispanic and had an evil grin directed at them. The man on the right had light brown skin and hard blue eyes that really betrayed nothing of help at that moment. The white skinned man in the middle had a small grin on his face, his gray eyes somewhat gleeful, and the lamp post light glistened off of his grey air. Despite looking to be an older man it was clear he was more than met the eye himself.

"Who are you?" Leo demanded. It was clear they weren't innocent people out and had even probably been looking for them.

"Dad." Jennifer whispered softly as she moved closer to Raph.

"You're her father?" April questioned.

"This is where you chose to run." The man, who had to have been Fulcanelli, questioned the young blonde. "You ran to New York only to become allied with two teenage brats and four mutant freaks?"

"Brats?" Casey questioned hotly as Raph chimed in with his own, "Freaks?" Jennifer's presence by his side was the only thing stopping the red masked turtle from attacking while April raised her arm in front of Casey's chest to stop him.

"You were either really clueless to run here." The Hispanic man said as he gave Jennifer a frank look that Raph felt made her shudder and angered him more. "Either you're more clueless than we thought or you're as dumb as I always thought you were."

"That's it!" Raph exclaimed and launched himself at the man. As the red masked turtle approached him the man drew his fist back and punched him in the face hard, sending Raph sliding a bit.

"Raph!" Jennifer gasped and came to his side.

"Get over here, little girl." The man growled and reached for her arm but April threw her Tessen and it sliced into his hand and then ricocheted back into the red head's hand.

Donnie noticed gray creatures literally crawling in from behind them. They slowly started to rise and gave off a sound that he wasn't sure what to make of. "Guys, we have more company." He said.

"What are those things?" Casey wondered.

"Ugly comes to mind." April said.

"Those are my Imps." Fulcanelli told the team. "And they are going to tear you to shreds, except of course my daughter who will be coming back where she belongs."

Raph was getting up. "I'll show you a thing or two you gray haired…" He was stopped by Jennifer placing her hand on his arm.

"Get them." Fulcanelli ordered his demons.

There seemed to be twenty four of them. Half of them shot fireballs from their hands while the other half leapt toward them. Casey was the first to respond by raising a hockey stick and swinging it into its stomach, sending it flying backwards.

"Hector." Fulcanelli looked toward the Hispanic man and then the other man. "Gregory." The two men started to advance as well.

"Hector, huh?" Raph said as he stood up and raised his sais. "You and I are going to have a word or three." He then jumped at him.

"Um, can we talk about this?" Mikey asked as Gregory started to walk toward the orange masked turtle. When the man jumped up and aimed a kick at his head, which caused Mikey to drop to the ground like a dance move and then twirl to face him again he said, "I guess not."

"Great, we get left with these things." Casey said. "I don't know what's worse, the fireballs;" As he said that he dodged one of them. "Or the attempts to claw our eyes out."

"Yeah, I'll get back to you on that one Jones." Donatello responded as he extended the blade to turn his bo staff into a Naginata and impaled the Imp demon that jumped at him. It screeched and then readied a fireball, which caused Donnie to drop it and then kick it in the head.

One of the Imps leaped at Leo and he intentionally fell with it so that his feet were positioned against the minor demons stomach before thrusting up and sending it into the pavement. As it started to rise Leo remembered the Dark Oni and used his sword to decapitate it. It dissolved into nothing. "They're not human, we can deal with them full force." Leo announced.

"We already knew that one." April reminded their leader. "But at least now we know how to defeat them." One of the Imps jumped toward the red head and she knelt down to her knees and brought her Tessen up basically slashing it from its head to its abdomen before it dissipated away.

Casey dropped the hockey stick to draw his metal bat, the heaviest weapon in his arsenal, and brought it down on another Imp's head, causing it to dissipate. "Glad to see these things don't leave blood or anything." Casey voiced.

Hector was swinging punch after punch at Raph and he was blocking it, but he had to give the guy credit; he was so fast that getting offensive was going to be a challenge. "What could a freak like you see in a useless thing like that?" He demanded and then laughed. "Of course, why would she have any interest in a freak?"

"Because you call her a 'useless thing'." Raph responded with a glare. "You don't know the first thing about her."

"I've been working for her father for years. I know all that I need to know about her." The man said with a malicious grin.

"That's it!" Raph roared and slammed his fists into Hector's face hard, then leaned down and kicked him in the stomach. "I'll teach you to speak about any girl that way, let alone her!"

Fulcanelli started toward Jennifer. "You ran, and what good did it get you?" He asked his daughter. "Now you're new human friends and these freaks are going to die." He stated.

"Don't underestimate them." Jennifer said as she stood up, though she did look a little scared. "They've fought things worse than your group of thugs and even worse than those demons you now seem to be toting around." She took a deep breath as she kept an eye on her father. "What did you do to me anyway?"

Fulcanelli cocked his head a bit. "Do to you?" He asked.

"I know I heal faster, your other goons made sure I learned that not too long ago when I got here. And I know about the psychic abilities." Jennifer replied.

Fulcanelli laughed a little. "I see. Well the first was inevitable and really I'm surprised you hadn't figured that one out sooner." He answered, sounding just a bit more ominous than any of the others would have liked. "As for the other, how could you possibly find that one out?"

That told Jennifer a lot. Someone else he had around had the same ability. She suspected that she was meant to be a battery to whoever he had under his rule to use. "That doesn't matter." She said.

"It doesn't." Fulcanelli agreed. "You'll be coming with me anyway."

"I won't let you take her." April stated as she came to stand by her blonde friend. "Casey and the guys can handle your demons."

"One little girl defending another." Fulcanelli noted. "How ironic. How sweet. How stupid."

"April, please." Jennifer started. She didn't want to see her friends hurt.

April shook her head. "No. You risked quite a lot to help me when May was controlling my mind and you don't have the training I do." She stared straight at Jennifer's father as if daring him to attack. "I owe you at least the same."

"Hey, these things go down easier than Footbots." Casey noted as he smacked another of them in the stomach with the baseball bat and then in the head, causing it to dissolve.

"Speak for yourself, dude." Mikey said as he barely dodged Gregory's attack. He had proven to be just as quick as Hector and the truth was he wasn't as good at fighting as Raph was.

Leo decapitated another Imp. "Mikey, stunt double." He called out and started toward his brother.

"Huh?" Mike asked confused. Gregory was about to punch him in the head when Leo leapt up and kicked him backwards and then got ready to deal with him. "Oh, got it."

Hector swung at Raph and he ducked under it, positioned his sais to lock in his wrist and then flipped him onto his back. He then moved to try to drive his elbow into the man's face but he dodged and Raph barely avoided hitting his elbow on the pavement instead.

Fulcanelli moved with seeming lightning speed and tried to slap April in the face. She dodged it and shot a kick into his shin, though it didn't seem to do much to him. She then brought her Tessen up and got a good gash in on his face.

He laughed. "Well done, little girl. I underestimated you." He looked at her and for a moment she swore the cut on his face was showing green skin. Then he lashed out and slammed his fist into April's face and she fell hard.

"April!" Donnie exclaimed and jumped up and kicked him in the face hard as Jennifer went to check on her friend. She was glad to see April was already getting up.

Luckily the Imps were pretty much down to nothing, freeing Mikey to back up Leo against Gregory while Casey went to back up Raph against Hector.

"Your demons are gone." April said as she wiped a bit of blood from her lip where it had been split open. "You're going to lose."

"Perhaps, perhaps not." He said. His arm turned into a black flame and shot it at Donnie. Just the look of it sent the purple masked turtle's nerves on edge and he barely dodged out of the way. The flame ended up consuming a trash can and literally turning it to ashes.

"I didn't know he could do something like that." Jennifer said softly. "Though it seems there's a lot about him I never knew."

"Your red headed friend is next, just to make you suffer Jennifer." Fulcanelli said with a cruel glint in his eyes. But he never got the chance as Donnie swung his bo staff into the man's shins. Unlike April's strike at him Donnie got the man fully off his feet and the black fire dissolved.

Hector was on a less even front between Raph and Casey and started to back off toward his boss, though he shot some very malicious glares Jennifer's way. Gregory backed off toward his boss too but seemed far less interested in the young blonde than his partner had been.

"It seems you're right." Fulcanelli said as he glanced at Jennifer. "I did seem to underestimate your friends. I won't make that mistake again." With that he snapped his fingers and a portal appeared, the three men stepped through and then before Raph could jump in after them they vanished.

"Are you okay Red?" Casey asked as Jennifer and Donnie were helping her up.

"I think I'll be fine." April said.

"You should be." Donnie agreed. "The gash on your lip has already sealed itself up, but we should have you ice that up just in case."

"It's time to go home." Leo stated, surprised that Splinter's food had survived the ordeal.

The walk back was uneventful. Raph stayed close to Jennifer and that seemed to make her feel better. As they got into the lair Leo went to get Splinter while Mikey went to the kitchen to get ice for April's lip.

Raph sat by Jennifer, April sat next to her. Casey managed to take the spot next to April before Donnie could and he instead sat just behind her.

"Your dad is a real jerk." April said to Jennifer. "No offense."

"None taken." Jennifer reassured her friend. "I've thought it for a while now, and lately it's only been proven more than I ever imagined."

"That Hector jerk," Raph started and hesitated a moment before hurrying on. "Has he hurt you before?"

Jennifer bit her lip a little and looked down. "Yes." She admitted softly.

"I'm going to kill him." Raph stated.

April took her hand and squeezed it gently. "If you ever want to talk about it, we're here to listen." She promised.

"All of us." Mikey seconded as he came in not only with an ice pack for April but with Ice Cream Kitty herself since he knew that Jennifer seemed to really like the frozen treated kitty. He sat her down on the table, surrounded by a bowl. Ice Cream Kitty meowed and Jennifer reached out to stroke her cheek.

"You know if those things were the best thing your father could send out at us, then he's going down quicker than the others." Casey tried to say cheeringly.

"I suspect it is not." Splinter said as he came out with Leo. "Leonardo told me what happened and I am sorry to say I have heard about the power your father has wielded against you all."

"The black fire?" Donnie asked. "How bad could it be?"

"La Brulure Noire, French for The Black Burn." Splinter answered his son grimly. "If one is hit by that attack, they are killed. No one has ever survived it and there is no known defense."

Jennifer and April exchanged glances, both of them realizing how close Donnie could have been to being killed.

"Dude." Mikey said quietly. "That is so not cool."

"Gonna have to be careful Donnie." Casey noted. "You were that close to being a pile of ashes." Despite the flippant words even his concern was clear.

"I was also sorry to hear about your father and his minions, particularly Hector." Splinter said as he put a hand on her shoulder. "My ear is always open if you wish to talk."

"Thank you sensei." Jennifer said, tears coming to her eyes. She found it hard to believe that she had found people who cared about her so much after starting to learn what her life was truly like.

"You were very brave to try to stand up to him April." Splinter noted as he looked at the red headed soon to be kunoichi.

"It's the least I can do for her after all she did to help me with May." April said. "Besides, she's my friend too."

"And how are you my son?" Splinter asked Raphael, knowing full well that he had a soft spot for their newest friend and suspected it could very well become something more.

"Angry, pissed off, ready to make them pay." Raph answered honestly. "But that's going to have to wait until we're all ready for it. Going off on my own for revenge would be pretty stupid." He gently patted Jennifer's hand, causing the blonde to smile a little.

Splinter nodded approvingly, knowing only two years ago Raph would not have followed that advice short of his own command to do so.

"Demons, ghosts, that Black Burn." Casey commented as he shook his head. "Almost makes me wish it was just Shredder and the Foot."

"Do not underestimate." Splinter warned. "The Shredder may not be aware of all that is going on now but he will do his best to adapt."

Jennifer shuddered just a little as she leaned her head against Raph's shoulder. April leaned back, her head ending up on Donnie's knee and she didn't seem too worried about moving.

Mikey and Leo sat on the floor as Mikey turned on the TV. Splinter took his food and retired to the dojo. He knew his family should enjoy the quiet while they could because it was clear it was only going to get worse. While he suspected that all the players had shown up on the field he was still sure it could only go downhill from there.

All the arrivals have shown up, how will things begin to heat up? What kind of demon is Jennifer's father aligned with? What other troubles await our heroes? But first the return of two of the first mutants to ever cause the turtles trouble.


	10. Slither and Crawl

Disclaimer: Don't own TMNT, just Jennifer.

Even though all of the gangs had been quiet for a few days, people kept disappearing. At first the turtles didn't know why but now on this patrol they did know. They were now chasing none other than the first man to be mutated after their first trip to the city, the one Mikey now called Snakeweed. And currently he was holding a citizen of New York in one of his vines as he ran from the turtles.

"After that weed!" Raph stated. "Hmm, never thought I'd say that one."

"At least now we know who's abducting the people." Donnie stated. "And that he's probably going to turn them into fertilizer like he wanted to do last time."

"Fertilizer is made of people?" Mikey asked, having forgotten they already had this conversation but had forgotten about it.

"Actually…" Donnie started.

"Later." Leo interrupted, also remembering that and the fact they abruptly ended that line of conversation last time since they had said their youngest brother had not taken it that well.

"You reptiles really are very clueless." Snakeweed laughed. "You have no idea what's going on."

"Why don't you explain it then?" Leo said.

Snakeweed laughed at them again. "Yeah, right." He stated. He then leapt over a few cars and when the turtles rounded the corner he had disappeared.

"What the hell? How did he pull that off?" Donnie asked.

"What do we do now?" Mikey wondered.

Leo glanced around. "Let's hit the rooftops and see if we can track him from there. He couldn't have gotten that far." He said.

Meanwhile in the sewer systems of New York April, Casey, and Jennifer were walking in some of the tunnels, wanting to get out a little but knowing right now they were being advised not to go top side unless it was for them to go home, and since Jennifer lived it the turtles even that reason didn't apply to her.

"How'd you get so used to the smell?" Casey asked Jennifer. "I barely have."

"I've been living down here for weeks, it's kind of becomes second nature." Jennifer answered. "Not sure if that's a good thing or not."

"I know what you mean." April said. "I got used to it after I had to stay with them when Shredder decided he wanted me to take to the Kraang."

"I hope it never has to get that way with me." Casey remarked.

"Don't worry about that." April teased her friend. "You'll never be that special." Then she pursed her mouth in thought. "Then again, maybe it's actually better that way." Jennifer giggled though neither was sure which part made her laugh.

April then frowned a little and Casey looked at her. "What's wrong Red?" He asked.

"I...I don't know exactly." She admitted. "I feel as if we're being watched."

Casey then noticed movement on the surface and gasped, "Wow! Giant Spider!"

Both girls looked up and Jennifer screamed, not liking spiders in general and the big one looking down on them now took the cake.

"Spiderbytez." April grimaced, remembering what the turtles had said about this mutant that had beforehand been a temperamental man.

"You heard of me?" Spiderbytez questioned and laughed. "I guess I should be touched." He then leapt of the sewer ceiling and grabbed Jennifer in his arms and as he leapt back up the ceiling he remarked, "You don't like spiders, blondie? Then I think you need to get a bit of up and close and personal time with one."

"Let her go." Casey demanded as he simultaneously dropped a puck and drew a hockey stick and shot it at the mutant spider.

He used one of his appendages to block the puck as he started towards a manhole. "See you losers later." He mocked and laughed.

As the two teens started to follow him April pulled out her T-phone and called Donnie. She heard the purple masked turtle answer with, "Hi, April. Sorry but now is not a good time. We're trying to find Snakeweed again; he's the one taking people."

"I don't know about that Donnie." April retorted. "We're in the sewers and Spiderbytez just got his hands on Jennifer."

"Wait? Spiderbytez has Jennifer?" Donnie questioned.

April could hear the reaction even from the T-phone. "What?" Raph demanded.

"He just went up the manhole on 12th and Bernard." April told Donnie.

"We're not far from there." Donnie said. "We'll meet you there so we can get Jennifer back from Spiderbytez." He paused just a moment before adding, "In fact I think Raph just might beat us both there."

Unfortunately when Raph landed he didn't see any sign of Spiderbytez or Jennifer. "Damn it." He muttered. "Where is he? What did he do with her?"

In a few moments April and Casey came up from the sewers while the other three turtles caught up with Raph. "What do we do now?" Raph asked angrily. "Spider boy has Jennifer while Weed head is taking people."

"Calm down Raph." Donnie said. "The one good thing about him taking Jennifer is that I can use her T-phone to track her so we can rescue her."

"Jennifer is our friend, I get that." Mikey said. "But what about the innocent people? How do we help them?"

Raph glared at Mikey angrily but April stepped in. "Mikey is right, but we do need to get to Jennifer before something happens to her." She looked at the guys. "Raph, you really want to rescue Jennifer and Donnie has to use the T-phone to track her so the three of us can go after Spiderbytez."

Leo nodded, catching on. "Casey, Mikey and I will continue tracking Snakeweed. Unless I miss my guess, this might not matter though." He stated.

"Why not?" Donnie asked.

"Because two mutants abducting people in the same city and not being related are probably slim." Leo stated. "But just in case we go with April's plan." Then the two groups split up.

Leo was right though. The two mutants met at a large warehouse. Snakeweed was binding the citizen he had taken while Spiderbytez tossed Jennifer against the wall and started to web her up. "Those freaks are now on to us." Snakeweed said. "We need to start making our demands before they ruin it all."

"Do we have enough people?" Spiderbytez asked. "We want to make sure we're getting a huge payoff for the release of these hostages."

Jennifer laughed a little, causing the two mutants to look at her. "You two are in this for the money?" The blonde questioned. "Really, what would you guys do with it, order things from eBay? Especially since there are other things brewing out there."

"Mouthy little girl aren't you?" Spiderbytez said and laughed. "Guess we got to give you credit for that much."

"Then give credit to this." The blonde said seriously. "Raphael and the other turtles are going to beat you down when they find out from my friends that you kidnapped me."

"You mean the Kung Fu frogs?" Spiderbytez questioned. "Yeah, we'll take care of those clowns soon enough."

Snakeweed had finished with his latest capture and looked toward his current partner in crime. "I'm going to make sure the turtles receive a proper greeting. I highly suggest that you call in our ransom before they ruin it." The weed mutant said.

"Yeah, yeah. Fine." Spiderbytez conceded. Jennifer could tell their 'alliance' was tenuous at best and was really just a moneymaking scheme. Privately she was sure at least one was planning to betray the other and possibly both were.

Leo, Mikey and Casey continued on and Leo was pretty sure he knew where they were going. That was confirmed when they saw Snakeweed. "This doesn't seem right." Casey noted.

Snakeweed laughed. "Time to play turtles…and whoever you are." He added as an afterthought since he hadn't seen Casey before. Then his tentacles shot into the ground and started to burst in and out in the ground as they started toward the three of them.

"Let's go guys, and be careful." Leo stated as the three of them ran forward, each of them doing their best to take out the tentacles that were coming at them.

"This is all fine and good." Casey pointed out. "But we need to figure out how to take this guy down so we can free his hostages and go help Red and your brothers."

"The first time we defeated him was at the Kraang facility when we tricked him into stabbing a tentacle into a generator and the second time Raph and I defeated him it involved liquid nitrogen." Leo told the two of them.

"So what how do we make this work now?" Mikey asked.

"Actually, Casey Jones has an idea." The hockey masked vigilante stated. "But we need to get closer first."

Because of Jennifer's T-phone the three of them were easily able to track to the lair. Raph looked at April and Donnie. "You guys free the hostages. I'm going to take that overgrown bug down."

"Arachnid." Donnie corrected his older brother and raised his hands in surrender when the red masked turtle glared at him.

"We'll take care of it." April promised him. "Just remember that you don't have to do this alone. Jennifer is our friend too."

Raph didn't really say anything to that as he kicked the door open and they came in. Spiderbytez turned to look at them. "Well, the blonde was right. The Kung Fu frogs are here, and the one with the salad tongs at that." He mocked and laughed.

"We're Ninja Turtles." Raph corrected him. "And I'll teach you that you messed with the wrong one." He then ran straight toward his arachnid adversary.

Spiderbytez lashed one of his appendages out at Raph but he jumped up and slid the length, slamming his foot into the mutant spider's face. He staggered back and then Raph punched him hard in the face. "Pretty good, froggie." The spider mutant said.

"You ain't seen nothing yet." Raph said and tried to slash at him but this time the mutant spider dodged and one of his appendages slammed into Raphael and set him sliding back a little. Luckily for the mutant turtle he recovered quickly, which was good since Spiderbytez was already coming at him for a follow up strike that he blocked.

April went over and freed Jennifer, saving her at the last moment from the awkward fall. "Are you okay?" She asked her.

Jennifer nodded. "Yes. We need to help Raph though." She said.

April shook her head. "No can do right now. He's determined to do this on his own. He has been ever since he heard Spiderbytez grabbed you." She replied. She saw the news shocked the blonde.

Donnie had freed the others quickly and quietly and they promptly left through the door Raph had kicked down. Spiderbytez was too distracted by the fight with Raph to notice their bounty escaping.

Mikey was the first one to get through and he tried to kick Snakeweed but he moved clear and Mikey skidded past him. Leo was next but his attack was blocked by a tentacle and he was thrown into his youngest brother. "You aren't going to get the best of me this time turtles." Snakeweed promised them.

"Just wait and see Snakeweed." Mikey responded.

Snakeweed started to unleash his tentacles on the turtles, completely ignoring Casey, which was of course what the vigilante wanted. He dropped a puck on the ground; this one had a lit fuse in it. He pictured the mutant body and took a deep breath before calling out, "Hey, Snakeweed."

"Huh?" He started to turn and look at Casey, who used his hockey stick and hit the puck which sailed through the air and landed into the space containing his heart. The initial impact stunned him just long enough for the fused puck to explode, taking the mutant out into pieces.

"Nice shot, Casey." Leo complimented him. "Now let's go find April and the guys." The other two nodded and three of them started to follow the T-phone signal. None of them noticed a remnant of the heart start to grow and even give off a pump.

"Come on, Raph." Donnie called out. "You got this."

Raph dodged two more appendages from Spiderbytez. "Give it up buggy. We've freed the hostages so there goes your money tree." Raph declared. "Your scheme is done and soon you will be too."

"Then I'll at least have the pleasure of taking you out." Spiderbytez snapped and then shot some of his acid spit at the red masked turtle. He dodged the disgusting projectiles.

The two girls joined Donnie. "Can't you help him?" Jennifer asked the purple masked turtle.

"I could." Donnie said. "But that isn't what Raph wants and considering I don't want to piss him off I think it's best to go with what he wants."

"Raph." Jennifer called out somewhat desperately.

Raphael jumped over the arachnid mutant and looked to Donnie and the two girls. "Don't worry, I got this. Get outside. I'll be with you in a moment." He said.

Donnie hesitated a second but then nodded. "Alright but if you're not out by the time the other guys show up we're coming back in." He warned and then the two of them basically dragged Jennifer out of the warehouse.

"That was a big mistake." Spiderbytez said. "You're going to regret that."

"If that's what you think than take your best shot." Raphael stated.

Spiderbytez shot more acidic gunk at him and Raph started to side jump around it, causing it to burn holes in the floor and damage a couple of support pillars. Raph was now in the middle of the two. "Is that the best you got?" Raph taunted.

"Hardly." Spiderbytez snapped and ran at Raph. He lashed out an appendage as Raph leapt to one pillar and it smashed, then another followed the red masked turtle as he leapt to the other pillar, then leapt again, this time straight at Spiderbytez, sending him sprawling forward.

Spiderbytez turned to Raph only to see him standing there. He brought his left hand up with his thumb up and then copied what he had seen Triple H do to Randy Orton so long ago after he had gotten his first world heavyweight championship. He went from the thumbs up to thumbs down and stated, "Ribbit, ribbit."

"Why you…" Spiderbytez started but stopped when he heard cracking sounds. The two shattered support pillars fell right toward him as the floor gave out under him and he disappeared into the darkness.

"Time to go." Raph said to himself. "I can't leave the lady waiting." And he started out of the warehouse.

"Dudes!" Mikey exclaimed as the guys caught up to Donnie and the two girls.

"Did you take care of Snakeweed?" April asked the guys.

Casey nodded. "He's been dealt with Red." He promised. "He got the blast out of our fight, courtesy of Casey Jones; expert vigilante."

"I think that's almost a contradiction there Jones." Donnie said.

Leo ignored their banter as he sized up the situation. "Where's Raph?" He asked.

"He wanted us to come out here." Donnie answered. "I told him we'd do that until you guys got here."

"Which you are." Jennifer said. "So let's go help Raph."

They were all starting towards the warehouse when they saw half of it caving in. "NO!" Jennifer screamed. She dimly heard the others expressing themselves as well. They stood there in shocked silence for a minute before they saw a figure emerging from the dust.

"Is that Raph?" Casey asked.

"It is." April noticed. They all ran toward the red masked turtle, Jennifer was the fastest and she threw her arms and Raphael and hugged him tightly.

"Hey, it's okay." Raph told her as he hugged her back gently, lifting her off the ground a little. "I told you, I got that."

"Dude, that must have been epic. " Mikey said.

"It was." Raph responded as he set Jennifer on the ground and let her go. She released him but still stayed close by him. "And I thought it was brilliant." He then started to tell his brothers exactly what happened as they started back to the lair.

Raph told the story again to Splinter when they returned to the lair. The rat master nodded his approval. "Very cunning Raphael." He said. "Though perhaps a bit reckless."

"Yeah, I know." Raph admitted. "It's just he…rubbed me the wrong way."

"I see." Splinter said. He was already very much aware that Raphael seemed to be developing feelings for Jennifer and he knew luckily that blonde already more than shared those feelings. It was only a matter of time before his son fully realized this. "You must still be cautious. The next reckless behavior may not turn out in your favor."

"I understand sensei." Raph promised.

Splinter nodded. "Good. Now let us go join the rest of our friends as I believe dinner should almost be here." He stated as the two got up and headed into the living area.

Leo was practicing on the punching bag; Mikey and Casey were watching Crognard the Barbarian and Donnie was on his lap top. He looked up. "The girls should be here any minute with the pizza." He said.

"What're you up to brainiac?" Raphael asked as he sat next to his purple masked brother.

"I'm keeping an eye on the missing persons list to make sure that everyone turns up accounted for." Donnie said. "If they don't then we know either there are hostages that Snakeweed and Spiderbytez took we don't know about or that someone else is also kidnapping people."

"In which case it could become our problem." Leo said.

"It might still not be related." Splinter reminded his sons. "But a very good idea never the less. It does not hurt to be cautious."

The two girls came in with the pizzas and set them down, to which Mikey immediately dug into it. Jennifer got a couple of slices of pizza and took one to Raph, sitting down next to him.

"The sad part is as far as things go; this has been the easy mission of late." April lamented. "And I doubt it'll get any easier."

"You're probably right." Leo answered. "But whatever comes of it we'll deal with together, as a family." He looked from his sensei to his brother to his three human friends and stopped on Raph and repeated, "Together."

A nice little interlude piece I think that also helps Jennifer and Raph get closer. Next time the separate effects of the gangs start becoming more apparent.


	11. Distraction

Disclaimer: Don't own TMNT. Do own Jennifer, her father and his top henchman.

"The news is saying that some people are still missing." Donnie said as he, his brothers, Jennifer, April and Casey were walking in the sewers towards the lair after picking up some pizza and cake. "No information, no leads, nothing."

"It doesn't necessarily make it something that we need to worry about." April said. "But we can't prove that we shouldn't worry about it."

"Makes my head spin." Casey noted.

"Things have been quiet on patrol lately." Leo commented. "We haven't found anything to indicate the gangs are responsible for the disappearances, or really even still active."

"We know they're out there Leo." Raph replied. Jennifer walked beside him, keeping her peace in this discussion. "It's only a matter of time before someone does something. We have two demon sponsored creeps, another guy we can only assume is the lesser of all the evils despite his Dark Oni, and Shredder and all of his little foot minions."

"It'd be foolish to forget that we have another enemy as well. They might not be part of the war but they are allied with the Shredder." Donnie interjected. "We can't forget about the Kraang."

Speaking of the Kraang, there was a base near the docks that was currently in operation. A couple of Kraang were transferring some information to TCRI for a project that they were working on at the request of their ally Shredder.

One of them thought they heard a thumping noise. "We should go and check out the unknown noise that is known as the noise." The first said.

"Agreed, we will go check the source of the unknown noise that is the noise." The other said and the two of them walked out into the corridor. On the floor was a grate that had fallen from the top of the ceiling.

"We should check the things known as the security cameras to see if there is anything known as intruders in the place known as the labs." The second decided. The two of them went back into the room and activated the security cameras. The front camera leading outside caught their attention immediately.

The first one activated an alarm and announced, "All Kraang, prepare for an attack from the ones known as the Mighty Mutanimals."

Slash and Leatherhead lead the charge, their combined muscle and bulk being able to smash the door in.

The Kraang playing guard duty turned to fire but had their weapons levitated away from them and then were shot with their own weapon thanks to the psychic powers of the mutant that was formerly neuroscientist Tyler Rockwell.

A couple of Kraang came out from a side door but was attacked almost immediately. The first was from the last regular member of the Mighty Mutanimals, Pigeon Pete, who pecked somewhat futilely against the mechanical body, but at least the force pinned the Kraang until Slash came over and finished the job.

The other Kraang had its arms removed when it was smashed into by the skateboarding mutant Mondo Gecko. He lashed his tail out and slapped the drone in the face, distracting just long enough for Leatherhead to finish the job. "Thanks for letting me join up guys." He said to the others.

(A/N: I am going to assume that Mondo Gecko will become a member of the Mutanimals at some point in the very near future if he isn't already so in their next appearance. He's been the only other consistent member besides Slash in all other incarnations).

"No problem, Mondo." Slash said to the mutant gecko. "Now come on guys, let's shut this place down." Slash told his team.

They continued on for a bit and took out a few more Kraang, and then they turned the corner to see something new. There were over a dozen creatures. They looked to be Minotaur like but they had horns on their heads the curved down, their skin was a pale kind of pink and they only had two hooves instead of four.

"Um, new Kraang? Or new mutants?" Mondo Gecko questioned.

"Not like any kind of life form I've seen associated with the Kraang." Slash noted.

"I have not seen anything like them either." Leatherhead informed them.

They gave a guttural kind of roar and then started toward the Mutanimals.

"Stand your ground team." Slash ordered, which was when they pulled their hands back and hurled green fireballs at them.

The turtles were close to the lair, but a left turn caused them all to draw up short. Jennifer gasped in fright as Raph growled, "You!"

Hector smiled. "I see you remember me." He boasted.

"I'll show you how much I remember about you." Raph warned as he drew his sais.

"You must be pretty stupid to show up here." Mikey said. "We outnumber you and can totally take you down."

"I'm not that foolish." Hector assured him. "I'm not alone." From behind came spider looking creatures about the size of a child. They had six mechanical legs and two arms like appendages with claws at the end.

Then from behind them emerged smaller spider like creatures.

"Dude, that's just gross." Mikey said. Jennifer couldn't agree more personally.

"Kill the rest, bring the blonde to me." Hector commanded them.

"These must be more demons, like those Imps Fulcanelli commanded against us." Donnie realized as he drew his bo staff. "We better be careful."

Leo looked to Casey and April. "Keep Jennifer safe." He told their two human fighters. "Guys, let's go on a bug hunt." He drew his katana

"Arachnid hunt." Donnie corrected. "I think."

"Whatever, let's just squash them." Raph said.

April had her Tessens out while Casey had one of his hockey sticks out. Both were in front of Jennifer, who had backed up against the wall to minimize how much she space she could take up in this already crowded fight.

"On second thought, scatter." Slash declared. Four of the five did so while Rockwell used his psychic powers to deflect some of the plasma balls back at them. To his dismay being hit by their own attacks didn't seem to faze them much.

"What are these things then?" Pigeon Pete asked.

"Good question." Slash replied. "Maybe Rockwell can hack into a Kraang database and find out before we shut this place down.

At that point over a dozen Kraang droids showed up. "It is the ones known as the Mutanimals and the ones known as the unknowns." One of the Kraang declared.

"Great, we're surrounded." Mondo noted. "This was a hell of a bad time to join up."

Luckily for the Mutanimals some of the unknown Minotaur things turned away from them and started to attack the Kraang.

"Should this be one of those 'enemy of my enemy is my friend' moments?" Rockwell questioned.

"I wouldn't count on that." Slash answered. He raised his mace. "Just take them all out."

"Easy for the one with the giant mace to say." Mondo commented as he got on his skateboard and headed to the middle of the fray to cause some 'friendly' fire between the other two opponents.

Leatherhead roared and charged forward, grabbing one of the Minotaur creatures and lifting it up before throwing it hard against the wall. The force and the impact caused the creature to dissipate upon impact.

"At least we know we can get rid of them." Pete said happily as he flew up and prepared to dive bomb one of the creatures.

The good news was that the spider demons, both varieties, seemed to be easily defeated and dissipated into nothing as their Imp predecessors had. The bad news was that their numbers were worse than the Imps, seemingly on the same level as either the Kraang droids May had utilized or the Dark Oni Yen had utilized.

"When I get over to you I'm going to wipe that smug grin off your ugly face." Raph yelled at Hector as he kicked one of the smaller ones into the wall, which dissipated upon contact.

"I don't know if you should talk about looks, turtle." Hector said somewhat defensively. "And as for getting over here, well good luck with that."

"Raph, focus on what's in front of us before we worry about him." Leo told his brother.

"That's a little easier said than done Leo." Mikey commented as he dodged the arms of one of the child size spider demons. "These things are popping up like really disgusting popcorn with six metal legs."

"Where are these things coming from anyway?" Casey asked. "It's like they're just teleporting in."

"That might not be far from the truth Jones." Donnie told him. "It's possible that they have a way of teleporting from wherever they reside to here. It would explain how these really little ones," To prove the point he slapped one of them with his bo staff and made it dissipate against the wall. "Came in from behind us despite the fact there was no evidence of their presence moments before."

"How does that help us now Donnie?" Raph questioned.

"It doesn't." Donatello answered simply. "But Casey asked a good, intelligent question and I could answer it."

"Thanks." Casey said with a grin which faded into a scowl as he considered the fact that he might have just been insulted. "I think."

"My bosses' minions are legion." Hector gloated. "You can't possibly defeat them all before they wear you down and tear you to pieces."

"I wish I could help." Jennifer said softly. "This is all my fault after all."

"This isn't your fault; this was coming regardless of whether you ran here or not." April reprimanded her friend gently but firmly as she used her Tessen to dismember one of the smaller demon spiders to jump at her. Then she looked to Casey, "Can you handle these things on your own for a minute?"

Casey shrugged. "Yeah, probably. What's up Red?" He answered.

April looked to her blonde friend. "Because, I think you can help us if you're really willing." She stated as she placed her Tessen back into her pockets.

Jennifer nodded. "Tell me what to do." She replied.

The combined firepower of the Kraang did manage to take out a Minotaur creature or two while Leatherhead and Slash were able to take out a few more. Some of the enemies took out each other while trying to take out Mondo. Pete aided where he could, and as the enemies dwindled in number Rockwell was able to use lasers and projectiles to help take out the competition as well.

"How many of these things are there?" Mondo wondered

"The Kraang or the Minotaurs?" Pete asked.

"Both." Mondo answered.

"I don't know." Slash said. "But try not to worry about it and just focus on taking them all out."

Leatherhead wound up in a tug of war match with one of the minotaur creatures. Despite the thing being a bit smaller than mutant gator these things could easily match both him and Slash in physical strength. At last he got the upper hand by tearing its arms out of the sockets, causing all three parts to dissolve. "These things are quiet strong and durable." He noted.

One of the Kraang came out of nowhere. "We have transferred the information known as information to the place known as TCRI." It stated.

"Then it is time to do what is known as cut our losses." The other Kraang stated. "Activate what is known as the self-destruct sequence and let us do what we can to make sure the ones known as the Mutanimals are what is known as taken out."

April reached out and took Jennifer's hand. "Focus. Concentrate. Think about that fight, about those numbers." Jennifer did so as she closed her eyes, thinking that might help her focus more on what her red headed friend was saying instead of what was going on. "Focus your energy. Imagine the wave we created back at the Kraang base to stop May and those Kraang droids."

Jennifer took a deep breath and imagined a bubble originating from herself and April and then expanding to overtake Casey, the Turtles, and especially Raphael who she knew wanted to get to Hector. She had to admit it was a sweet gesture but was afraid it might get him killed. None of that mattered though if these spider things weren't stopped.

"You're time is running out turtles." Hector taunted. "You'll grow tired but they won't. They will rip you to shreds soon enough."

"No. I won't let them get wiped out. I won't let us get wiped out. We will prevail. We have to prevail." Jennifer whispered to herself as she tried to focus on the bubble in her mind and force it to expand, her voice grew stronger though as she spoke until she said in a frim voice, "This has to end now."

She didn't see it on account of her eyes being closed but Jennifer swore she felt exactly what she envisioned, a bubble expanding from April and herself and wiping out the demon spiders. She was convinced for a moment it was simply her imagination until she started to hear demonic shrieking and then she knew. She and April had done it.

Casey was the closest and the first to see the effect. "Good job, Red, Jennifer." He cheered.

Mikey saw the effect next. "Booyakasha." He stated.

"Wow, awesome." Donnie said next. The two girls were definitely taking his psychic research to the next level.

Leo and Raph saw the effect at the same time. Hector was not happy. "Don't get confident turtles. I kept one surprise hidden." From the shadows came another spider demon similar to the first ones except it was a big as Rahzar or Rocksteady.

"Dude, it's the Freddy Kruger of demon spiders." Mikey quipped.

"Not funny." Casey stated. "Um, can you two do that again Red?"

"No." April answered. She was barely keeping herself conscious and again Jennifer had passed out.

"Don't worry about it." Raph said to them. "Casey, keep the girls safe. We got this."

Mikey's switched his nunchuck to the Kusarigama and wrapped up the things legs as best he could before it tried to charge them. Leo and Raph used their weapons to declaw the monster, and it in turn tried to swipe at them anyway but they dodged quickly.

That left Donnie, who jumped up and flipped the switch to extend the blade on his staff, turning it into a Naginata and drove the point of the weapon into the large spider demon's head as he saw Raph do to its little brother with his sais. The thing dissipated and Mikey and Donnie fell to the ground with a thump.

"I hope Gregory got the time that he needed." Hector murmured before he ran off.

"Get back here." Raph stated and was about to run after him but Leo stopped him.

"No, Raph. Forget him. We need to get April and Jennifer back to the lair." The blue masked turtle stated.

Raph took a deep breath. "You're right." He conceded. He went over and took Jennifer into his arms, whispering "You did good honey." Then looked to April. "You did too."

April smiled and nodded. "Thanks, Raph." She said just before nearly fainting herself. Donnie rushed over to support her but at least she stayed conscious.

Mikey and Casey recovered the food and they continued their journey back to the lair.

"I'm thinking it's time to go." Mondo Gecko stated. "Before we become ex mutants."

Slash had kind of wanted to get his claws onto some of the Kraang's data before getting rid of the base but knew that if they didn't leave now they weren't going to leave. The Kraang were retreating anyway though the minotaur creatures didn't seem to care. "Mutanimals, fall back." Slash commanded.

"Wait." Rockwell said. He was looking past the minotaur creatures to see a dark skinned human male coming out of the corridor. The demons looked to him but didn't attack. Even worse, the man held several canisters of mutagen.

"Is that bad?" Pigeon Pete asked.

"Very bad." Leatherhead replied. "That is the same substance that made us and the turtles what we are today."

"Not to mention every other mutant currently running around this city causing trouble, including Tiger Claw and the other foot mutants." Slash added.

The man, Gregory, seemed stunned. "More mutant freaks. Damn, the boss was hoping Hector's distraction of the turtles would make this a cake walk." He stated.

The Mutanimals were a bit concerned about the mention of distracting their other friends but had to let it go on the back burner for now. "Drop the mutagen." Slash ordered.

Gregory shook his head. "I don't think so." He said. "Time to go Knights."

All five of the Mutanimals tried to charge them but both the man and the Knights as he called them disappeared.

"That's unsettling." Mondo noted.

"That looked like some sort of teleportation." Rockwell noted. "But I'm not sure how that could be possible."

Leatherhead looked to Slash. "I suggest we go to the turtle's lair. We can see if they are okay and if they know what is going on around here. There is more than meets the eye to this." He voiced.

Slash nodded. "I agree." They started toward the exit. "Let's go." Not long after they had made it outside they heard the Kraang base by the docks go out in an explosive burst.

Jennifer recovered as they reached the lair but did not move out of Raph's arms until he set her on the couch. April sat next to her, both girls exhausted. "Are they alright?" Splinter asked as he emerged from the dojo.

"They'll be find, sensei." Leo said. "They used their high powered psychic move to wipe out some spider demons." He then backtracked and told their father what happened on their way home from getting dinner.

Splinter sighed. "They are getting bolder in their moves. This suggests that they are getting ready for their end games soon." He stated. "We must be prepared."

"I hate to say it Splinter, but I don't see how." Casey said. "These last few battles have wiped us out more than any of us care to admit. Just look at Jennifer and April."

"We just don't have the numbers compared to the gangs we have to face." Donnie admitted with a sigh. "Fulcanelli and his multiple demons, Chein Khan and the Goldens, the Foot Clan and even Yen and his Dark Oni."

"Not to mention at least two of these guys have demon sponsors that could do who knows what." Raph added as he crossed his arms across his chest. "We're only a bit outnumbered here."

"The odds are indeed daunting." Splinter conceded to his students. "But we must work with what we have, all seven of us." He knew one thing for sure, this was a battle that he couldn't sit out of he had the choice.

"Master Splinter." Jennifer interrupted softly.

"Yes my dear?" He asked.

Jennifer took a deep breath. "I came to this city running from guys. I faced overwhelming odds to help the turtles find April when May controlled her mind. I was here in the lair when Yen had his Dark Oni test you all. Hector is in town and has come after me basically twice now. I was there when Spiderbytez abducted me."

"Yeah, hell of bad thing." Casey noted. "Sucks for you."

Raph glared at Casey. A lot of that could be attributed to her knowing them and it actually kind of made him think she wanted to leave their company. The thought filled him with dread but if that is what she wanted he wouldn't stand in her way.

"Master Splinter, I want to help. I want to help innocents. I want you to train me so that I can defend myself, my friends, and the world." Jennifer stated.

Splinter watched her for a moment. "Your reasoning is sound and your motives are pure." The rat master stated. "I cannot fault you for your desires. You do have extensive gymnastics training and that will be a benefit." He moved to stand in front of the young blonde. "As I told April this will drain you mentally, spiritually and physically. I can guarantee that you will not be fully trained by the time this gang war comes to a head and it will be very dangerous regardless."

"I understand all of that. I know that all." Jennifer promised. "I still want to do my best."

Splinter nodded. "I will endeavor to do what I can to help you." He told her. "We will train you."

"We?" Jennifer asked.

"I'll help you." April told her. "I've done all of this so recently that it's fresh."

"I'll help you too." Raph said. "I want to make sure that you can keep yourself safe and follow your dream; to be able to help us all out."

"I'll help you too." Leo promised. Mikey and Donnie agreed to as well.

"Thank you." Jennifer said with a small smile, tears glistening in her eyes.

"We shall start it tomorrow morning." Splinter told her.

Fulcanelli watched as Gregory came into their hideout. Hector was by his side, irritated that he could not get Jennifer from the turtles. He lamented that his henchman seemed more angered about his daughter's whereabouts than he, her father, actually was. Obsession could do that to a person. "Did you get what you were sent for?" He asked.

Gregory placed a bag on the table. It slid open to reveal three canisters of mutagen. "I did." He answered. "And none too soon. The alien's base came under attack from five other mutants. I can only assume they escaped the bases self-destruction."

"The city is crawling with more mutated freaks than we thought." Fulcanelli conceded as he reached over and picked up one of the canisters. "Soon though we will make sure this fight will include freak against freak."

The group had just settled down to eat their dinner. Jennifer seemed to be happy about the idea soon she would start being just like her friends. She knew that even if she proved a martial arts prodigy she wouldn't be able to make that big of a difference in their numbers and that concerned her as much as it did everyone else.

They heard the turnstiles and saw Mondo Gecko and the four Mutanimals enter. "Wow, this is so rad." Mondo stated.

"Hey Mondo." Casey said.

"Hey Leathehead." Mikey said.

"Hello my friend." Leatherhead replied.

"Hey dude." Mondo replied.

"What brings you guys here?" Raphael asked them.

The Mutanimals hesitated just a bit, not used to seeing Jennifer but they quickly recovered. "We wanted to make sure you were okay." Slash said. "We attacked a Kraang facility and someone mentioned they had distracted you."

Jennifer sighed. "My father sent Hector to distract us. But why did he do it?"

"This dude stole some mutagen." Mondo answered and described the guy.

"Gregory." Jennifer filled in with another sigh.

"What does your father want with mutagen?" Leo asked Jennifer.

"I wish I knew." The blonde conceded. "But I think we can all take some guesses."

"Swell." Raph grumbled.

"Guys, I have an idea." April said. "There New York Museum of Natural History has an ancient Japanese exhibit that went up yesterday. I think tomorrow night we should take a trip down there and see if somehow we can learn about those demons or anything that could help us."

"Chein Khan and Yen are Japanese." Donnie seconded the idea. "And Master Splinter you did say the Dark Oni were also of Japanese origin."

"As are the Foot themselves." Leo added.

"Wait, what are we missing here?" Slash asked. "Demons? Other gangs?"

"There's a gang war brewing." Leon answered him. "And come to think of it, we could use your help with this. We're vastly outnumbered against all of the syndicates and can use all the help we can get."

"Even if it is from Pigeon Pete." Raph mock sulked though only Jennifer heard him and she decided to ignore it.

"You can count on us." Slash promised. "Right, Mutanimals?"

"Right." They all chorused.

"Wait, you're a Mutanimal now?" Mikey asked Mondo.

"Well, pretty much." He said.

"You are welcome to stay here and accompany us to the museum tomorrow." Splinter told the Mutanimals. "If you wish to be involved in stopping this gang war you should know everything we do."

"We accept, great Splinter." Leatherhead said.

"Then rest up, tomorrow we begin our quest of knowledge." Splinter said. "And let us hope that quest also leads us to something greater."

What does Fulcanelli intend to do with the mutagen? What can they learn at the museum? The Mutanimals seem to be here to stay and that is good because the Foot Clan have a plan that will need all hands on deck if they want to survive. Additionally, team TMNT could use some good allies, and if you know of any feel free to say something. Things are only going to heat up from here.


	12. Bad Night by the Museum

Disclaimer: Don't own anyone in TMNT here except Jennifer; the mystic ninjas were originally in the '03 series.

Shredder sat in his throne as he gazed down at all of his minions. This time Hun, leader of the Purple Dragons, was in attendance as well. "Bradford has reported that this Chein Khan has a demon sponsoring him, but to what end is not known." The leader of the Foot clan said. "The Kraang have said they were attacked by unknown creatures, as well as the Mutanimals, just last night."

"So we have two of our adversaries using demonic assistance?" Bradford, the mutant skeletal dog, questioned.

"It would seem so." Shredder said. "We know absolutely nothing about the other syndicate in this organization."

"That in itself speaks volumes." Xever the purple mutant fish with mechanical legs voiced. "With all of the underground buzz this is attracting and the sources at our disposal we should at least know something about them unless they have some higher power protecting them."

"I had this thought as well Shredder." The mutant rhinoceros that was Russian arms dealer Ivan Steranko said as well.

"First robots and mutants, now aliens and demons." The mutant warthog and 'master' thief Anton Zeck mused with a shake of his head. "What is this world coming too?

Shredder ignored that comment. "With that in mind Karai uncovered something that could prove useful, and tonight we will all be going to retrieve it." He told them.

"Including you master?" Bradford asked, surprised.

"Including me." The armored leader confirmed.

The day passed pretty much eventfully. Splinter began Jennifer's training with April and the turtles checking in throughout the time to make sure she was doing okay and not pushing herself. The blonde understood that she would not become a ninja overnight but she likewise knew that if she wanted to have any chance at participating in what was to come she needed to be as prepared as possible.

"At least she only needs to learn offense and defense moves." April had said at one point. "She's proved easily that she has the agility and speed pretty much down pat."

"True." Splinter had agreed. "Of course the offense and defense are most of what will keep her alive and fighting."

The Mutanimals hung around the lair, Pete spending most of his time in the rafters. When the turtles weren't checking on Jennifer they were hanging with the Mutanimals. Slash and Raph spent a lot of time playing games. Donatello and Rockwell spent most of the time in the lab, though no one knew exactly what they were working on. Mikey, Casey and Mondo spent most of the time watching TV (as had Leatherhead) but had skipped out for a little in the afternoon to skateboard around the sewers, or roller blade in the case of the vigilante. What time April had not helping Jennifer she spent doing research on the exhibit so that way they could narrow down where they needed to go.

Toward the end of the afternoon Casey and April brought pizza to the lair so they could have dinner and review. "Most of our time will be spent among the artifacts and the mythos section." April said. "This is where we'll likely find any information pertaining to the demons."

"Makes sense." Donnie agreed.

"If we have time though, I think we should check in on the weapons section and see if anything is said about the history of weapons and enchantments." April added.

"Not a bad idea either." Leo agreed as his free hand stroked the side of his katana, which like the other weapons used by the group had been enchanted after the discovery that the Golden's used a time slowing smoke bomb in an attempt to gain an advantage.

"In fact when we return to the lair I shall get your mace enchanted." Splinter told Slash.

"That would be appreciated." Slash said to him. "But how do we protect the rest of my team?"

Splinter thought a moment. "I suppose we do not have to limit this enchantment to weapons. Any object of significance could do it." He replied.

"Mondo's skateboard and Rockwell's helmet should do it for them." Donnie said. "Not sure about Pete or Leatherhead though."

"Hey, maybe my helmet could be enchanted." Pete suggested as he got another piece of pizza crust.

"That could work." Raph agreed. "Not too bad there."

April tried not to laugh. The red masked turtle giving a compliment to someone that annoyed him from day one as far as she knew could only be due to the influence of someone like Jennifer.

"But what about Leatherhead?" Mikey asked.

No one really had an answer for that one right now, not even Leatherhead himself.

"Of course if I can use my powers to stop the smoke bomb from exploding then the whole question becomes moot." Rockwell boasted.

No one knew what to say, especially since that was always a possibility. After that the Mutanimals took the Shellraiser, with Rockwell driving. The turtles, April, Casey, Jennifer, and Splinter took the Party Wagon to drive to the museum.

"Rockwell and I figured out a way to disable the museum's security." Donnie revealed to them. "That way we can get in, see what we need to, and get out without setting off any alarms or leaving any trace we were there."

"How?" Casey asked.

"Hack into their systems and shut off the alarm. Rockwell will make the cameras go on a loop with his abilities until we leave." Donnie explained.

Both vehicles were parked and Donnie and Rockwell did there thing before they left and entered the museum, heading toward the Japanese exhibits. As they started to search they were finding nothing of use. There was some information about oni's but nothing that Splinter had not told them already.

"I'm starting to think this is hopeless." Mikey said. "We're not going to find anything here."

"Some of these artifacts are pretty though." Jennifer said, trying to look at the bright side. She was looking at a medallion called the mystic talisman. No one was quite sure what the Japanese symbols meant, which was a bit disturbing all things considered.

"How can we be sure any of these things are even relevant?" Casey asked.

"We cannot." Splinter answered. "Demons have been around longer than humanity can recall."

"Some of the more…obscure members of the scientific community would say that demons were actually chased away from this plane when humanity started taking over. It is even said that the last demon attacked a human and changed them, making them the first vampire." Rockwell said.

"Sounds like you don't believe that." Donnie noted.

"A few years ago I wouldn't have." Rockwell replied. "Of course since then several of my views have been changed drastically."

"I know what you mean." April said.

Leo turned around and looked behind them. "I think I heard something behind us." He said.

The others started to look around too. Then from one of the corners a Footbot came out of nowhere, it managed to leap over a snapping jaw from Leatherhead, roll past Slash's mace, dodged past Donnie's bo staff swing, under Mikey's Kusarigama and then pushed Jennifer out of the way as it broke the glass containing the amulet.

"Jennifer." Raph gasped as he and April ran to check on the blonde.

"I'm fine." She promised them both. "But why did it grab the amulet thing?"

"Only one way to find out." Splinter said. "Follow the Footbot. Raphael and April, keep an eye on Jennifer, she must come with us, we cannot leave her here and we do not have time to take her out of harm's way."

"Hai, Sensei." April and Raphael said unanimously.

The group followed the Footbot, for better or worse they didn't have to go far. They were lead to a construction site and to everyone's slight horror they found the Footbot had approached Shredder with the amulet. He was flanked on either side by every one of his henchman sans Stockman. From left to right was Rocksteady, Bebop, Tiger Claw, Karai (right by her 'father's' side) Rahzar and Fishface.

"Oh, this is not good." Mikey said.

"Well, well." Shredder stated. "if it isn't the rat Hamato Yoshi and all of his little friends."

Karai cocked her head. "Who is that?" She inquired about Jennifer.

"That was the girl that I saw the turtles rescuing not too long ago." Rahzar responded.

"You saw that?" Donnie asked. "You're spying on us now?"

"It was a lucky break." Rahzar admitted.

"What do you want with that?" Leo demanded of the Shredder.

"There are things even you do not know about the Foot." Shredder said, not looking at Leo but instead looking at his old rival. "One of those things is this; the amulet. With this…well, wait and see." And with that he brought his hand up and intoned, "Mystic Heralds, appear before me."

For a moment they thought Shredder might have lost his mind. Then the amulet did glow and from it shot five lights. They landed in front of Shredder. They were tall and gaunt, each of them holding what looked to be a spear in their right hand. When they turned to look at the turtle their eyes were red and they seemed to lack noses and were dressed in some sort of battle armor like what they had briefly seen on Chrome Dome. Each was a different color; one red, one blue, one brown, one gray and one green.

"Wow." Casey said. "That would look so cool under normal circumstances."

"Why are they colored so strangely?" Mikey asked.

"They are each a representative of elements." Splinter answered his youngest son. "Fire, water, earth, metal and wind."

"Oh, boy." Pigeon Pete murmured.

"Heralds, destroy them." Shredder commanded.

Leo and Pete found themselves against the earth herald. Raph and Slash found themselves against the fire herald. Mikey and Leatherhead ended up against the metal herald. Donnie and Rockwell ended up against the wind herald. Casey and Mondo ended up against the water herald. Splinter stopped the two girls from trying to fight as he knew Jennifer wasn't ready and he wasn't sure April was in this case either. Shredder and his army didn't move from their positions.

Pete was able to avoid most of the earth heralds attack as he was flying. Still, the occasional mud ball that was as hard as a rock still posed a problem as he discovered from the first one. Leo kicked him the first time he tried to use a quicksand like attack to bury the mutant pigeon but when he tried to slice through him with his katana the herald turned into little more than dirt in that area to avoid the attack.

Raph had to dodge most of the fireballs the fire herald threw at him. "Talk about a hothead." He commented and then shook his head. "I've been spending too much time around Mikey." Slash used his mace to knock the fireballs away but had to be cautious as each fireball made his weapon just a bit hotter to handle.

Leatherhead had to dodge past the metal blades the metal herald kept forming. He was strong enough to endure the gator mutant's hits and he already knew his teeth would not dent their metal opponent. Mikey was unfortunately not faring much better as his nun chuck barely made a scratch.

Rockwell used whatever objects he could find to try to attack the wind herald but the herald was able to pretty much blow them away. Meanwhile Donnie was having trouble hitting him as well as he was just too agile.

The water herald shot a huge blast of water at Casey and he barely was able to dodge. He continued to try though and eventually struck him. It felt to the vigilante like he was drowning until Mondo cruised by on his skateboard and grabbed him. "Told you I'd make up for the roof debacle." The mutant gecko said to him, referring to the first time they had met and he had deliberately not rescued him from falling off the roof.

"Thanks man." Casey said. "But what do we do now? We can't get near this guy."

"You must play to your strengths, and their w weaknesses." Splinter told them.

"Huh?" Mikey questioned.

"I think I get it." Donnie said to his youngest brother and looked to Rockwell and Leatherhead. "Time for us to switch."

They did so. While Leatherhead didn't seem to be extremely effective against the wind herald either at least he wasn't risking getting himself injured in the process, but he still got in some hits. He was more distracted though by the fact that Mikey's nunchucks were being used as mini fans to make it harder for him to dissipate and avoid as many attacks.

Meanwhile Rockwell was able to deflect several of the metal blades the metal herald threw at them, and Donnie was able to go forward and strike at him. Unfortunately he was still not able to do much damage.

Shredder laughed. " This is going so well." He said and looked to his soldiers. "Help them out and put them all to an end, once and for all."

Tiger claw licked his chops as the rest of the mutants laughed a bit and jumped at them.

Tiger claw then charged at Leo but the blue masked ninja dodged it

Fishface jumped at Mondo, and he barely dodged out of the way as Casey rolled to the side.

Rahzar slashed at Mikey but he got quickly intercepted by much larger opponent in the form of Leatherhead.

Rocksteady likewise charged at Raph. He dodged out of the way and as the mutant rhino turned to face the smaller turtle again he was attacked by the larger turtle Slash.

Bebop tried to blast his hip lasers at Donnie but Rockwell used his psychic abilities to reflect the blasts, making sure to direct some of them at the metal herald. That seemed to draw some contention from him but Shredder holding the amulet put a stop to any confrontation there.

Shredder jumped at Splinter. "It's time to finish this once and for all rat." He stated.

"The end will only come for you, Shredder." Splinter countered before the two ninja masters went at it with fists flying and quick leg kicks that were hard for anyone to follow.

"Well, princess. I guess it's just you and me." Karai said as she drew her tonta and approached April. "Unless your little friend thinks she can keep up with you." It was left unsaid that, especially the way she was now, Karai didn't view Jennifer as good enough to keep up with her. The sad part was right now she would be right.

April drew her Tessen. "I can take you on Karai. I've been training big time with Master Splinter." She said.

Karai just laughed and attacked the red head. She was even more swift and merciless than April remembered though she attributed some of that to the mind control worm that was controlling her actions.

Jennifer watched her friends. They were all holding their own although perhaps just barely. She did truly did not know how to turn the tide.

"Face it reptiles. Your time is done." Rahzar taunted as he swiped at Mikey. He dodged it and managed to kick him in the chest. "No way." The orange masked turtle responded.

"This isn't you Karai." April tried as she blocked one of the kunoichi's attacks. "Remember when you came to me, realizing that Shredder lied to you and that you were having doubts about his honor."

"That was a mistake." Karai said simply.

"No, it wasn't." April countered. "You meant it at the time, but then Shredder inadvertently mutated you and whatever that entailed nearly destroyed your mind."

Jennifer blinked in shock as a realization struck her. She remembered Donnie saying that Karai was mutated differently and it was making her lose her mind. Somehow it had been restored but she thought that perhaps even though it was mostly restored there had to be some kind of damage that wasn't so easily repaired, if it could at all. That meant to her the worm had an easier time controlling her than it had Raph and Rockwell.

Likewise she remembered Raph saying when his pet turtle was mutated into Slash, it seemed to warp his brain which was why he went after his brothers, but that seemed to fade as he stopped a Kraang that was going to shoot Raph, refused to follow the destructive path of the Newtralizer and finally became leader of the Mutanimals. It was Rockwell who freed Slash from the mind control worm.

Jennifer took a deep breath and charged Karai, ramming into her and saying, "April, help me keep her pinned."

Karai very nearly broke free before April joined her. Even then it was a struggle. "What now?" April asked her.

Jennifer made sure one hand was now next to April. "Concentrate like we did in the Kraang lab, or down in the sewers. We can force that mind control worm out of her." She said.

April nodded and both girls focused, though it was very hard to impose their psychic wills and hold Karai down. Then they heard her whisper, "April…" As if she was starting to realize something was wrong.

Unfortunately for the two girls Shredder noticed this. He dashed past Splinter and kicked the two girls hard off of Karai. Whether or not he would have pressed this advantage became a moot point as Splinter now protected the two of them.

Shredder hated to leave, for the first time in a while he had the advantage over his old nemesis, his students and their allies. But he didn't want to lose Karai either and it seemed that if left as it was right now they might very well force the mind control worm out of her and he would lose to them again. "Retreat." He raised his voice and ordered as he squeezed the talisman and recalled the heralds.

Raph wanted to press the fight anyway until he noticed that Jennifer and April were shakily getting up. Donnie was the only one quicker than he was in getting to the two girls. "What happened?" He heard the purple masked turtle ask.

"Shredder attacked them when he saw them holding Karai down." Splinter explained.

"They held Karai down?" Mikey asked, impressed.

"Just barely." April answered.

"Why would you two even try that?" Raph asked as he helped Jennifer and kept a hold of her arm.

"Because I wanted to save her." Jennifer answered.

"Huh?" Leo asked. "How is that even possible?"

"It was actually Rockwell's idea." Jennifer answered. "From when he did that for Slash."

"Oh?" Rockwell inquired. "I think we need a bit of an enlightment there my dear."

"As we head toward the vehicles." Raph added. "Just in case Shred head changes his mind about leaving this battle."

"I remember you saying you thought the mutagen might have warped Slash's brain." Jennifer said as she looked to Raph and then looked to Slash. "No offense."

"None taken." Slash assured her. "On reflection that's exactly what it seemed like."

"And Leo, you said that Karai said she was losing her mind when you guys found her on Coney island." Jennifer said.

Leo nodded. "That's right." He confirmed.

Donnie snapped his fingers as he caught on. "I get it. Leo broke Raph by making him angry, just like I did with Rockwell. But Slash's mind was damaged by the mutagen and needed his psychic abilities to break him free. Karai seems to have had her mind restored on the surface, but some sort of residual damage is probably there." He stated.

"I don't get it." Mikey said.

"The brain is very complex Mikey." April started.

"Most of them anyway." Raph joked but let it go after Jennifer gave him what he assumed was her serious look.

"Anyway," April continued on. "The brain is one of the few things that no one knows everything about even in this day and age."

"Yeah, sometimes it can almost magically heal itself, like Slash's seemed to do. Other times despite everything it can't reverse or even stop the damage done to it." Donnie supplemented. "As seems to be the case with Karai."

"But you thought if you and Red combined your powers, like you did against those spider demons in the sewer, that you could overwhelm the mind worm in Karai's brain." Casey realized, nodding his head. "Wow, that actually might have worked."

Jennifer looked to Splinter. "If I'm right, we can save your daughter." She said.

Splinter seemed stunned for just a moment before nodding. "Yes, it might be possible." He agreed.

"But why not just ask Rockwell to do it then?" Pete asked. "He did it once before."

"Because we were the only ones there." April answered for her.

"Admittedly from everything Donatello and I have discussed, it seems it's possible that if April and Jennifer were to learn to control their powers and work together, they would be even stronger than I." Rockwell said.

"Of course we're a long way off from that." April said. "Jennifer can barely access her powers without me helping her."

"True." Splinter agreed. "But if your encounter with May and the Kraang droids she controlled are any indication you should not estimate even your combined raw, untapped abilities."

"I completely agree." Rockwell said. "That incident is one of the major reasons I believe the two of you combined could equal out my powers."

"They are also the least threatening on the surface." Leatherhead provided. "It was, and still will be, easier for them to get closer to Karai for that purpose than for Rockwell or any of us too."

"We're also the least likely to be needed when the time comes that we all have to come to a head with these gangs." April said. "Rockwell will be needed with all of you for the big fight." She sighed. "Which I'm sorry to say that the whole point to this trip seemed to have been for nothing."

"I would not say that." Splinter told the red head. "We learned that the Shredder now has powerful new allies to aid him." He looked around them all. "In fact, their performance today should be a reminder to us all. They are just as dangerous as any of the other syndicates even with their demon sponsors."

"My father and the others didn't come here looking for you guys, they came here to fight each other. You're just in the way." Jennifer said. "Shredder and the foot came to New York specifically to find and kill you guys."

Leo nodded. "If anything this may have been a bit of a wakeup call." He agreed. "But not only did we learn that, we also learned something else. That there's a good chance we can still save Karai."

"Shredder noticed that too, that's why he attacked you two." Raphael reminded them. "He's not going to be so casual about letting Karai in that position again."

"We will have to worry about that when the time comes." Splinter said. "If this were to happen during the upcoming gang war he may have very little time to worry about it."

"What is the next step anyway?" Pete asked.

"We're going to find someplace close to the turtles." Slash told him, told all of the Mutanimals. "Their lair has come under siege once and another time very near there. Meanwhile we keep this up and the other gangs will start hunting for us too. The closer we stay to each other the safer we'll be until this is over with."

"Don't worry dudes; we'll help you figure out where to go." Mikey promised.

They approached the Shellraiser and the Party Wagon. "We begin our search tomorrow then." Leatherhead stated.

"We'll see if we can start to uncover anything that can help us." Leo said. "There are still disappearances that we can't be sure aren't linked to this, though we don't know why."

"Maybe you can also figure out why my father stole mutagen." Jennifer added.

"There is only one use for mutagen that we know of." Donnie said. "The question is for what reason."

"I just hope whatever it is, we can handle it." Raph said. "We barely got through our first encounter with Bebop and Rocksteady."

"We can handle it." April said as she looked around at everyone. "As long as we stick together."

Shredder's forces have gotten stronger than ever, what can the turtles do to adapt? Can Jennifer and April use their powers to free Karai? Next time the turtles find out why Fulcanelli stole mutagen.


	13. Things Change

Disclaimer: I do not own TMNT. I do own Jennifer, the two new female mutants and Hector.

April and Jennifer sat cross legged on the floor as Master Splinter approached them. "Today we will be blending two lessons into one." He told the two girls as he stopped in front of them. "The first lesson will be general practice, this one probably being far more important to you," He looked toward the blonde. "Then to you." This he said to the red head. "The second lesson will be working on your telekinetic powers, to both strengthen them individually and as a team."

"Hey, Red." Casey said from as came to the entrance of the dojo.

"Casey, not now." April said to him.

"Actually it is perfect timing." Splinter said. "For I have asked Mr. Jones to assist in this training as your opponent."

"Really?" April asked, kind of surprised.

"Yes." Splinter replied. "Your first objective will be to pin Casey down, the second will be to psychically take this," The rat master held up a medium sized purple marble. "From inside of his pocket."

"Yeah, so if you two girls think you're ready for it, try to take out the excellence that is Casey Jones." The masked vigilante said as he took out a hockey stick.

"Donnie will be sorry he missed seeing this." Jennifer joked lightly as she and April stood up. It concerned her a little that Casey had a weapon, that April could use her Tessen, and she didn't have a weapon at all. She wasn't sure she was ready for one though, so it was a small point.

"Don't worry." April said as she took out a tessen and unfurled it. "I'll take the first attack and you just watch my back."

"Got it." Jennifer said.

The four turtles were patrolling the city, jumping from rooftop to rooftop on patrol to search for any signs of trouble. As Leo had pointed out there was plenty of that out there between the Foot Clan, the Goldens, Fulcanelli and his gang and even the possibility of Yen and his Oni's. Things had gotten so hectic in fact that they knew somewhere in the city the Mutanimals were also on patrol during the night while trying to find a place close to the turtles lair during the day.

"So which is the lesser of two evils in this case?" Mikey asked as they ran.

"Technically it should be the lesser of four evils." Donnie corrected. "At least if that saying existed."

"I think after our run in with the Foot clan at the museum last night we should have all learned there is no such thing as 'lesser' of any evils." Leo said to his brothers. "Especially in light of the fact that even the Purple Dragons have a capable warrior in Hun."

"I'd still rather face Footbots than those spider demon things, or those other Minotaur things that Slash and the others described." Raphael noted.

Leo had to nod a bit. "I can't disagree with that one." He conceded.

They continued on for another couple of rooftops, but as they landed on the next one they were suddenly set upon by several smoke bombs, blinding them.

"What the shell?" Donnie questioned.

Leo thought he heard the sound of weapons being drawn. He drew his katana blades. The next thing he heard was a whizzing sound and he brought his blades up to find he had blocked a strike from a pair of bunrei; small scythes that he vaguely recalled April had had a choice of as a weapon before Splinter had given her the tessens.

The big shock came when the smoke started to clear and the opponent who's attack he had blocked had come from another mutant, and to be precise a mutant turtle who wore a white mask like theirs but no other pads or wrappings aside from what seemed to be a metal hospital looking bracelet on her right wrist. He was sure from the shape of the body that his opponent was also a girl. "What the…" Leo started.

"Remember your objectives." Splinter said as he took several steps back. "Subdue Mr. Jones and then psychically remove the marble from his pocket. Hajime!"

April leapt at Casey, swinging her tessen up. The masked vigilante blocked the attack with the hockey stick and tried to sweep his leg out to trip her, but the red head dodged him and back flipped around him, landing behind him though he quickly turned to face her. "That was epic." Casey admitted.

Jennifer took that chance to come up behind Casey, take a baseball bat from his equipment holder and then tried to swing it to disarm Casey of his hockey stick, but she didn't hit hard enough for that. It was enough of a shock though that he took a step back to keep both is eyes on the girl. "Got to remember not to underestimate you." He noted with an approving grin at the blonde.

"Nice." April complimented.

"Thanks guys." Jennifer said with a smile of her own. "Now let's take him down."

"Bring it ladies." Casey goaded.

The two girls leapt at him, and he jumped April's low attack as he blocked Jennifer's high attack, then whirled around and kicked the two girls, sending them back a little.

"Okay, we can't both be in front of him." Jennifer said to April. "He's too good for that one. So let's reverse this out, this time watch my back."

April nodded. "Will do, go get him."

Raph only vaguely noticed the white masked female turtle before he had to block a punch to his head. He found himself face to face with a more familiar opponent, none other than Hector, the one who had made it quite clear he was after Jennifer and she had made it clear that he had hurt her in the past. "You." He growled as he narrowed his eyes.

"I'm glad to see you remember me, freak." Hector stated as he aimed another attack at Raphael, this time landing a kick square into Raph's chest and sending him sprawling a little.

"Who should we be helping?" Mikey asked Donnie.

Before the purple masked turtle could respond they heard a voice behind them say, "I think you should be more worried about yourselves." They turned just in enough time to see a pink and white female mutant, this one almost looking like an Axolotl though she wore a midriff baring pink tank top and jean shorts and she also sported the metal hospital like bracelet on her right wrist, launch her tail right at them and slapping them to both sides.

"Another mutant lizard like Mondo?" Mikey asked surprised.

"Technically a salamander." Donnie clarified. "They originate in a lake in underlying Mexico City and they're virtually extinct, normally they don't develop the lungs but keep their gills and as a result don't live on land."

"Then what is she doing here?" Mikey questioned.

"That's a good question." Donnie said. "Maybe the mutagenic process allowed this one to start living on land."

"How did you get two mutants to work with you?" Raph questioned Hector as he stood up and recovered his sais.

"Wouldn't you like to know?" Hector said. "It's too bad though that you won't know. You won't even walk away from this fight."

"We'll see who walks away from this." Raph shot back and jumped at Hector. He blocked the attack and tried to trip Raphael with a leg sweep but the red masked turtle jumped over that and kicked him in the chest, returning the first attack.

"Why are you working for this jerk?" Leo questioned the female turtle as he tried to knock her weapons away. The female turtle held onto them like a pro and took a step back for just a second before attacking Leo, who parried them easily. "Who are you?"

The female turtle hesitated a moment. She seemed to be struggling. "It doesn't matter…who I am. What matters is that…I…I have to kill you all." She stated.

"It doesn't sound like you really believe that." Leo noted as he watched her. "Or that you even want to."

"And you're looking to kill us too?" Donnie questioned the mutant Axolotl.

She also hesitated. "I've always done what I have to in order to survive." She responded. "Though this is the first time killing has been part of it."

Hector launched a kick at Raph and he stepped back. He then looked to the two mutant girls. "Stop chattering and start fighting." He snapped at them as he waved his wrist. Leo and Donnie noticed the bracelets seemed to spark and give each of them a shock, which earned disapproving looks directed at Hector before they again faced the turtles.

"You really are a jerk." Raph noted as he got a good punch in at Hector's face, resulting in a split cheek. "Bossing them around like they're mindless puppets. Doing whatever it is you've done to Jennifer." Raph slammed his foot into Hector's stomach. "Glad you ain't my leader."

Hector stood and wiped some blood from his face. "They might as well be puppets." He told the red masked mutant turtle. "And as for them, or Jennifer, being mindless…"He started.

Raph leapt at him and drove his knee into Hector's face. "Rude, conniving, underhanded, and sexist." He commented. "You can't get much worse than that."

"I can't disagree with that one." The axolotl mutant admitted as she jumped at Donnie, who brought up his bo staff to block. The two of them began to grapple for the staff, her tail accidently slapping Mikey in the face as he tried to come up from behind her.

"Do you really want to kill us?" Leo questioned the female turtle again as he swung his katanas in a circle for a moment.

Again she hesitated. "It is what it is." She said solemnly and then tried to press an attack. Leo countered again and the two of them ended up disarming one of the others weapons. They now stood with one katana and one bunrei.

Jennifer swung the bat and Casey blocked it with the hockey stick. Jennifer almost lost the bat and was privately surprised that she still held it. Then Casey tried to swing at her and she instinctively dodged it as she had many punches in her life. Momentum carried her to the side and the masked vigilante tried to bring the hockey stick around as if she herself were the puck but she reached out and caught it, accidently snapping the bottom of it off.

Casey let out a shocked and slightly impressed, "Hey." That was when April came in from behind with her tessen, cut the strap of his equipment bag to stop her friend from drawing another weapon, and then shoved it to the side with her foot. Casey turned to her in surprise and Jennifer hooked her legs around his and tripped him up. He landed on the mat with a thump.

Both girls moved quickly and pinned his arms. In a real fight Casey would have used his homemade taser but he wasn't actually looking to hurt the girls.

Both girls started to concentrate their psychic powers even as Casey put up admittedly weak struggles. They had to resist the urge to shut their eyes in concentration since that might have been a horrible mistake. Then suddenly the purple marble shot rapidly out of his pocket though Splinter reached out effortlessly and caught it. "Yanmea!"

The two girls stood up and helped Casey to his feet. "You all did well." Splinter complimented them. "And it is to both of your credits that neither of you seem ready to pass out."

"Thank you sensei." April and Jennifer said. Truth was they still felt a bit tired but not nearly the way they did when they dissolved May's Kraang droids or when they dissolved the spider demons.

"Of course you must remember that if the time comes that the two of you face Karai and attempt to rid her of the mind control worm," Splinter started, his voice faltering just a fraction at the mention of his mind controlled daughter thanks to Shredder. "That it will not be this easy and she will fight you harder than Casey did now. This is in fact the first training session to prepare you for that. Not only will Casey continue to up his game, as it were, but you will eventually take these training sessions with each of the turtles unless Shredder forces this fight upon us sooner."

"Wow, good luck with that girls." Casey noted with a laugh.

Each of the girls had to privately agree that that made them a bit nervous. "Master, if we're done here, I'd like to get dinner started before the guys come back." Jennifer said with a small smile.

Splinter smiled at the young blonde who seemed to be attracted to his second oldest son. "Of course, dismissed." He said.

The three of them filed out of the dojo, Jennifer going to the kitchen. Casey picked up his hockey bag. "Gonna have to get this patched up again." He said.

"Sorry about that." April said.

Casey shrugged. "It's cool. Kind of surprised this hasn't happened before actually." He said.

"I think Donnie has something for that in his lab." April revealed. "I'll bring it to you."

Raph didn't think the two mutant girl's hearts were in this fight but didn't see any way to get them to back off either. He wasn't even sure Hector would let them back off either. That left only one option as far as the red masked turtle was concerned. Force him to run or end him here.

Hector must have sensed this as well as he rose up and literally rammed into Raphael, sending him again sprawling back. He moved to leap onto him and drive his fist into the turtle's face but he rolled out of the way, again having to recover his sais. Hector moved to clothesline him but the red masked turtle hooked his sais into his arms and tossed him onto the floor hard.

Unknown to the two of the, Raph's three brothers and the two mystery female mutants had stopped their own skirmishes to watch, as if they too knew that this fight would determine rather their fights would continue or not. "Keep it together Raph." Leo advised his younger brother, knowing this fight was as personal for the red masked turtle as it was anything else.

Hector got up and glared at Raph. He let out a frustrated growl and aimed a kick at the turtle's head. He dodged under it and delivered a punch to the side of the man's head. He then delivered a hard side kick to Hector that ended with a cracking of a couple ribs.

"You and your boss really think you have what it takes to beat us? To win this war?" Raph questioned him. "You don't have a chance. None of you can hold a candle to us, to what we've learned from our father, from what we inspire in each other." He ran toward Hector, who tried to deliver another kick but Raphael back flipped over him.

"Oh, yeah. Back flips are where it's at!" Mikey exclaimed happily.

Raphael landed behind him and turned to face him.

Hector was clearly growing impatient. He started to withdraw a hand gun from the side of his jacket.

To his brother's surprise the female turtle let out a gasp. "Hey, no guns!" She yelled.

Raph let a sai fall to the ground as he quick drew a shuriken. In the time it took Hector withdraw and raise the gun Raph let the throwing star lose, causing it to reflect off a satellite dish and then bounce off the roof before digging itself into the barrel of the gun. With a curse Hector dropped it.

"Nice throw." Donnie said with a smile. "I mean it's not a complex one like mine but it was a good one anyway."

Now Raphael recovered his sai and delivered a devastating kick to Hector, he slammed up against the staircase that lead to into the building himself and it knocked the wind out of him. Raph was in front of him now with his sai pointed right in between his eyes.

"Raph." Leo started as he started to move toward his brother. "Think about what you're doing."

"I know, mercy." Raph said as he glared at Hector. Then he pulled his sai away from his face and then place the point under the man's throat. "I'd tell your boss to pack up and go home if he wants to avoid an ending smack down. And if you EVER go near Jennifer again I won't show give you another chance."

"Wow, that was impressive." Mikey admitted and Donnie swore he heard the axolotl girl agree with his youngest brother.

Hector glared at Raph as he rubbed his jaw. "Aaliyah, Candy." He barked as he looked at the two mutant girls. "Let's go."

"They don't have to do what you tell them." Leo said.

It seemed the two were about to agree with him but with another flick of his wrist he delivered an even more painful shock to the two mutant girls and with the flick of the mutant turtle's wrist, revealing another smoke bomb, they all vanished.

"Nice job Raph." Leo said as he placed his hand on his brother's shoulder.

"Thanks Leo." Raph said with a roll of his eyes. "Let's get back to the lair, I'm sure Splinter and the others need to hear about this."

"Two more mutants." Donnie mused. "Now we know what Fulcanelli did with the mutagen."

"What do we do about them?" Mikey asked.

"We'll figure that out after we've talked to Master Splinter and gotten his opinion." Leo replied.

Half an hour later they were greeted by the smell of pizza upon moving past the turnstile of the lair.

"Welcome home, my sons." Splinter said. He looked to Raphael. "It seems as if your patrol turned out well."

"Not exactly." Raph responded. "But at least I got to make my point."

"Come and eat." April said. "Then we can talk about what happened."

"Sounds like a plan, I am hungry." Mikey said with a laugh.

"So what else is new?" Casey pointed out.

Raph sat by Jennifer, both of them exchanging smiles, before Jennifer started to pass out plates with the pizza as Casey handed out sodas to everyone except for Splinter who went with tea. Then Leo proceeded to explain about the encounter with Hector and the two mutant females.

"Bummer, more enemies." Casey mused.

"From what I'm hearing, I don't think we can count those two as enemies." April noted. She looked to Donnie. "Can I borrow you laptop for a second?"

The purple masked turtle nodded and handed it to her, though Jennifer noted the two of brushed fingers together and seemed to move away from each other a little slower than expected.

"Although I agree that these two did not seem truly malicious, the fact remains they were fighting against you and right now are fighting for Fulcanelli." Splinter said. "To underestimate them, whatever their motives, could prove to be fatal."

Jennifer cleared her throat. "For what it's worth, I can vouch that they can't be entirely willing about this. Those bracelets they're wearing were made by a scientist in my father's employ. He makes them for several reasons. Sometimes to ensure obedience in those he doesn't have a good amount of trust in." She sighed a bit. "I don't think he really trusts anyone fully, even me before I ran."

"And other times?" Donnie asked.

"Other times, it's used as enforcement for those he defeats. Or training when he finds someone he considers worthy of enslaving or selling." Jennifer said softly, clearly distraught about that revelation.

Raph shook his head. "What a bastard. " He gently squeezed her hand. "But none of that is your fault."

"So who was who?" Mikey asked. "I mean we heard him call out for the girls but we never got their names before that."

"The turtle had to be Aaliyah." April said as she faced the laptop around to Jennifer and the guys. " Seventeen year old Aaliyah James is a world renowned martial artist. She disappeared almost two weeks ago. They're even equating her disappearance on the same level as Chris Bradford."

"Rahzar." Mikey translated for Jennifer.

"About the same time that Snakeweed and Spiderbytez were kidnapping people for ransom." Leo realized. "It makes sense though, she was able to keep up with me move to move, at least as little as we actually fought."

"So the salamander was Candy." Casey guessed.

"Axolotl." Donnie corrected and was about to go on but Casey threw a crumpled up napkin at him and then a look at both of them from April stopped any further horse play.

"That also seems to mean that both of them didn't start out as mutants like us or Leatherhead, but are mutated humans like Dr. Rockwell or Mondo Gecko." Leo added.

"What of her disappearance?" Splinter asked the red head.

"There's nothing for her." April said. "My guess is she either came from the streets or a poor family. Either way this wouldn't draw the kind of attention that Aaliyah's disappearance drew from the media."

"Are we going to help them sensei?" Mikey asked.

Splinter looked to his youngest son and nodded. "Yes, Michelangelo, we are going to help them if at all possible."

"The first thing we…you guys need to do is remove those bracelets." Jennifer stated. "As long as those are there my father will use them to ensure their cooperation regardless of what they think."

Leo reached over and placed his hand on the blonde's shoulder. "Then that's the first thing we," He put an emphasis on that word which drew a smile onto her face. "Are going to do as soon as we can."

Hector could hear the conversation from the next room. "It seems as if freak against freak didn't work out as well as we'd hoped." Gregory noted annoyed.

"No, it didn't." Fulcanelli agreed. "Of course perhaps we shouldn't have expected as much from strong willed insolent little girls like the ones we found. They almost remind me of my daughter."

"I don't think you're giving them enough credit." The mutant Axolotl girl, who was indeed Candy, stated. "They're all good fighters and they actually care about each other instead of any of them seeing the others as tools."

He heard the sound of an electrical charge and moments later Candy screamed. Hector smiled a bit as he thought of his boss using a cattle prod on the what he thought of as the big mouthed lizard.

"This was only the first meeting." He heard the female mutant turtle Aaliyah state. "We'll be better prepared for them next time."

"See that you are." Fulcanelli responded. "I don't tolerate failure often."

If Hector didn't know better that would come across a warning to him as well. But unlike the little girls they had forcefully mutated to help deal with Jennifer's mutant defenders he had proven his worth. And he was determined to do it again. He approached another area, this one a small lab. It contained several cases that held DNA in it from several different animal species, including an empty one for a turtle and an empty for an axolotl.

Much like how Shredder had Baxter Stockman mix mutagen with warthog and rhinoceros DNA to mutate Anton Zeck and Ivan Steranko respectively they had done the same thing to mutate the two girls. "Freak against freak can work." Hector said to himself. "You just need the right subject." Then he reached for a hypodermic needle and a vial of mutagen.

What will Hector do, what will he become? What can the turtles and their allies do to help the female mutants from Fulcanelli's clutches? How will the others react to the new ones now thrown in the gang war? Stay tuned


	14. Disaster

Disclaimer: Don't own TMNT, I do own any character that is not specifically in the series, most notably Jennifer.

"So Rockwell thinks he found a good place." Slash told the Turtles, Splinter, April, Jennifer and Casey as they sat in the living room of the lair. "He wanted Leatherhead's help to clean out the area and he sent Mondo and Pete to get some things while we determine if we can make the location into a home."

"Where is that at?" Leo asked him.

"It almost seems at some point it was a plaza of some kind." Slash answered. "It even seemed to have a spring inside of it. Rockwell wants to test the water to make sure it's okay though. Make sure it's not poisonous or anything."

"Sounds really awesome." Mikey noted. "Can't wait to see it."

"Any assistance you require to turn your plaza into a home, we will gladly provide." Splinter told the larger black masked turtle.

"I am honored Master Splinter." Slash said with a slight bow.

"What I don't get is how come you're here then?" Casey asked. "I mean anything the large gator dude can do you can do."

"We decided we should find out if we missed anything." Slash answered. "And I was arguably the most expendable." He looked around. "And it sounds like we missed something alright. Two new mutants, and girls to boot."

"Aaliyah James and Candy." Jennifer provided. "They were kidnapped and mutated by my father Fulcanelli, to be part of his army."

"As if demons weren't bad enough." Raph added. "But at least we may not have to worry about killing them. We just have to figure out how to set them free. Along apparently with freeing Karai."

"You mentioned getting rid of the bracelets Jen." Casey said as he looked to the blonde. "Any ideas how to do that? They won't just let us walk over and take them off."

Jennifer frowned in thought. "Not really. If we can get close enough to them with a bladed weapon that might do it." She finally replied.

They had the TV going on low volume. Donnie was the first to notice something, "Guys, they're starting an emergency broadcast." He announced.

Splinter reached for the remote and turned up the volume as the reporter, the well-known Carlos Chang O'Brien Gambe announced not one, but four different strange occurrences. The first was a giant four legged creature in Central Park. The second was a floating creature roaming the skylines of New York. The third was another creature at the power plant causing havoc and the last was at an arena.

"Demons." Leo stated.

"You think?" Mikey asked.

Donnie nodded. "I agree. And did you see the pictures of the last three? Except for the lack of legs on the second one, all of them look to be the same thing."

"They remind me a bit of those Minotaur demons we fought at the Kraang base." Slash observed.

"So many attacks like this can't be a coincidence." Raph said.

"Agreed." Splinter said. "Raphael and Slash, go to the arena and stop that demon. Michelangelo and Casey, go to the park and see about the four legged demon."

"You've got to be kidding me." Both Mikey and Casey said at the same time but let their objections slide at a glare from the rat master.

"I'm afraid that Leonardo and Donatello," Splinter looked to his oldest son and his smartest son. "Will have to go alone."

"I'll go to the power plant." Donnie said to his oldest brother. "I think that demon is using the electricity to aid, maybe if I can stop that it will go away." Leo nodded his agreement.

"I'll try to contact the other Mutanimals to back us up as Raph and I get to the arena." Slash said.

"I could help too you know." April said.

"Indeed." Splinter replied. "But Jennifer is not at the stage where we can risk letting her help out, and as long as this is going on we might as well do another training session so that she can be ready as soon as possible." Both girls had to reluctantly agree with that one. He looked to the guys. "Now go."

They all nodded and jumped over the turnstile on their way out.

"What about the helicopters and camera crews?" Jennifer asked Splinter. "They might very well expose the turtles."

"Indeed." Splinter conceded. "But the police cannot handle this on their own, and it is possible even my sons cannot. But they are the best hope of preventing innocent losses."

Shredder too was seeing the breaking news along with his mind controlled adopted daughter Karai and his second in command Tiger Claw. "Do you wish to do anything master?" The mutant tiger asked.

"Why should this concern us?" Shredder questioned.

It was actually Karai who answered. "Father, it seems that this has to be the work of the syndicate ran by Fulcanelli. They're trying to cause chaos in the city."

"Then let them." Shredder stated and laughed a bit. "This is the first time we can get a good idea of what these things are capable with without using up any of our resources. I would bet anything Hamato Yoshi will send out his wretched pupils. We can observe two enemies for the price of one."

With the Shellraiser Donnie dropped Mikey and Casey in the park and then quickly made his way. It wasn't hard for Mikey and Casey to find what they were looking for. It was rampaging through the park, crushing everything in its path.

"Dude, that thing is reckless." Mikey stated.

Casey watched a moment and then retorted, "Dude, that thing is blind."

"Awesome for us." Mikey said. "Let's try to sneak up on it and see if we can find a weak point…heh, I just sounded like Leo."

They moved stealthily a few feet but the demon paused as if hearing something. A blue light shone from above the monster and later three small pod looking things came out and turned on light beams to scan the area. One turned in the direction of Mikey and Casey and then so did the demon.

"Ah, sewer apples." Mikey murmured. The demon raised its forelegs and then slammed them down, sending a shockwave at them and knocking them off their feet.

"What now?" Casey asked.

"I don't know." Mikey answered.

The demon tried to charge the two of them and they rolled out of the way. Casey noticed it seemed to lose track of them again, which lasted for all of a minute before another of the pod things spotted Mikey. He quickly dodged out of the spotlight just as the demon tried another charge attack.

"Yo, Mikey!" Casey shouted out. "Those pod things act as its eyes. Let's take them out and see what happens."

"You got it dude." Mikey said. He jumped up and kicked down a pod, destroying it. "These things are lightweights." He noted.

"Thankfully." Casey stated as he took out a hockey puck and shot it in the air, it hit one of the pods and reflected off a tree trunk to smash the other one. "Done."

The demon stopped and the blue light returned again. "Ah, damn." Casey said.

Mikey drew a few shurikens. "Let's see if we can stop this thing from making more eyepods." He declared and threw them just as the pods were about to emerge. It took out two of them, but the third had missed the mark. Instead it struck the light and it turned red, the demon roaring.

"Mikey, I think if we attack that light source we can defeat this thing." He stated.

"I just hope we can do this quickly." Mikey said as the last pod came through. "How many of these do we have to get rid of before this thing gets lucky with its size?"

"Perhaps I can help with that." They heard Rockwell say as he came up behind Mikey. "If one of you would please get rid of that pod, perhaps we can force this thing to retreat now." He raised his hands to psychically raise some of the debris that had fallen because of that very demon.

"On it, doc." Casey said as he dropped not one but three pucks. The first one shot destroyed the last pod.

"Get ready Michelangelo." Rockwell said. Mikey nodded and drew several shurikens.

The blue light showed up again. Rockwell threw as much debris as he could, along with Mikey releasing the shurikens and then also picking up some rocks quickly to add to that while Casey shot the pucks at the light and added a couple more in for good measure. It seemed as if the demon could not get anymore pods out and eventually a yellow light seemed to envelope the demon and caused it to disappear.

"Did we get it?" Mikey asked.

"I don't think it's dead." Rockwell answered. "But I do think we caused it to retreat."

"Man, I sure hope we don't see that again." Casey said. He couldn't help but notice the after effect of the process seemed to leave the shadow of a pentagon in its wake.

Raph and Slash showed up at the arena where the thing was clearly causing mass destruction. "That thing looks pretty strong." Raph noted.

"Let's see how strong it is." Slash said, and with a roar he ran out and intercepted the demon. It seemed to take the hit well, the demon locking claws with the large mutant turtle. "Yep, pretty strong." Slash emphasized to Raph.

Raph skidded the side of the arena's damaged wall and leapt at it from behind, trying to kick it. The demon released one of Slash's hands and grabbed Raph's foot, then with a mighty leap it took itself out of the stadium and onto the roof, dragging the two turtles with it. It released them with a heavy crash.

"That thing is really strong to drag me along that way." Slash noted.

"Yeah, and it took the full brunt of the roof smash without so much as flinching." Raph added and shook his head. "I hate demons."

Slash looked to the demon and noticed that something had changed. Now its chest cavity was open, seemingly exposing what he could only assume was the things heart. "Raph, check it out. Wonder what happens if we hit that." Slash said.

"Let's find out." Raph declared and threw a shuriken at the heart object. It caused the demon to roar in pain but it also closed the chest cavity as if the pain reenergized it. "Now we know it does something."

"We just have to get that thing to do it again." Slash replied. "And the only way I see is to make it expend its energy." Then the black masked turtle drew his mace and ran straight for the demon, slamming it into the demon.

It recoiled and roared at Slash. Then it threw a fireball but Slash dissipated it using his mace as a baseball bat. The Raph jumped past his one-time pet and kicked the demon straight in the chest, then slashed the thing with his sais. "Come on you damn thing." Raph stated. "Open up."

"You heard the man." Slash said and slammed the mace into the demons head. The thing roared and sure enough that caused the chest cavity to open. Raph slammed his sais into the heart like object and it roared again and slapped Raphael hard away from him. Then it moved to get away.

"Are you okay Raph?" Slash asked his friend.

"Yeah." Raph said as he started to get up. "Now get that damn thing so it doesn't escape."

Getting to the power plant was as easy as Donnie expected. Finding the demon at the generators was as easy as Donnie expected. What Donnie did not expect was that he wasn't alone. But it wasn't one of the other Mutanimals waiting for him. It was the female axolotl mutant Candy. She was trying her best to hit the thing, and she was even able to dodge the occasional electrical shockwave it was releasing.

"I've had more than enough electrical shocks to last a lifetime." Candy said to the uncaring demon as she involuntarily shuddered at the memory of Fulcanelli using the cattle prod to torture her for their failure to defeat the turtles the first time out.

Donnie used his bo staff as leverage to jump up and kick the demon really hard. "What are you doing here?" The purple masked turtle asked the axolotl girl.

"I was in the neighborhood." She told the turtle simply. "I…decided to up my game in preparation for dealing with you and your people again."

"I think you're out of your league Candy." Donnie told her. Then they both turned as the demon charged them, intending to shoulder ram them. Both mutants dodged out of the way and he admitted, "Actually I think we might both be out of our leagues."

"You know, that thought has occurred to me too." Candy confessed reluctantly.

"That thing probably came from your boss." Donnie told her. "You could just get out of here."

"He's not my boss…exactly." Candy countered. "As for leaving…I can't let this thing cause any more trouble than it already has if I can help it." She could see that her response surprised the purple masked turtle, and it surprised her too. Bravery was never her strong suit.

"Well, whatever you want to do, you still need a plan. And so do I." Donnie said. "I think we should put our problems to the side and work together."

"No way." Candy started. "I can…" She was interrupted by the demon's electrical shockwave, striking her and Donnie hard onto the floor. "On second thought, I'm in. So let's cut the chatter and get to work."

"Okay, listen up." Donnie said to her. "I've seen this thing drawing in electrical energy. We need to stop it from accessing the generators."

Candy looked around and sighed. "The only way I see to do that is to destroy the generators." She replied.

"Yeah, I had the same thought." Donnie said. "How's your aim?"

The axolotl girl dodged the charging demon. "Could be worse. I spent a little bit of time playing paint ball when I was a pre-teen girl." She answered.

Donnie came over to her and gave her three shurikens. "Let's hope that playtime pays off." Donnie said. "Take out the generators and I'll distract the demon."

Candy hesitated just a bit. She wasn't sure how the turtle could trust her given how she had basically admitted she wasn't too keen on trust or teamwork. She could just as easily abandon him or even backstab him. "I got your back." She promised as she took the throwing stars.

"Good to know." Donnie remarked and then drew his bo staff, charging at the demon. The demon swung but the purple masked turtle avoided the attack and kicked it in the shoulder hard. It was kind of disconcerting that the thing didn't seem to be drastically affected by the attack though he suspected it was more because of the strong build than anything else.

Candy looked around from her position and, in rapid succession though doing so one a time, she tossed the throwing stars and they smacked right into the generators. Each of them started to spark as they fizzled out and shut down, preventing the demon from drawing any more energy from them.

"Nice job." Donnie said to the axolotl girl. "Now we just have to get the demon to go away."

"Yeah, how do we do that?" Candy asked.

"I haven't figured that out yet." Donnie answered. "I guess all we can do is continue to press our attacks."

The demon seemed to have the same idea as it charged forward and aimed a massive fist at both of them. Donnie jumped to the left as Candy jumped to the right. The demon turned to face the mutant axolotl.

"Ah, hell." Candy muttered to herself as the demon started toward her and then moved forward to shoulder ram the girl. She wasn't sure she could dodge this attack and kind of closed her eyes to brace for the demon's horrific impact. There was a mass rush of wind but no pain and she opened her eyes to see herself staring at something she had never expected; another mutant lizard, a gecko of some kind.

"Hey." Mondo Gecko said to the axolotl girl he was now holding in his arms as they skated around and away from the demon. "It's okay, that thing won't be touching you." He stopped his skateboard and sat her back on the ground. "I better go help my friend over there put this demon down."

"Be caref…I mean have fun." Candy stuttered.

"Hey, Donnie!" Mondo called out. "I'm here for back up, so what now?"

Donnie thought a moment and then brought his bo staff in front of him. "Bring the demon thing closer to me, skate right into it if you have too." He answered.

The demon turned now to face the ninja turtle and Mondo decided to literally take Donnie's advice. He literally started to skateboard toward the demon as fast as he could.

Neither of them noticed that Candy decided it was time to slink away from the fight, no matter how reluctant she was to do so, now that Donnie would not be fighting alone.

Mondo brought jumped into the air with his board under him and slammed into the demon's back. It wasn't the biggest impact that he could have imagined and in fact he fell to the floor from the recoil. But it was enough for the demon to stumble forward. Donnie extended the blade from his bo staff, transforming it into the Naginata, and the demon ended up half impaled on the blade. It then vanished.

"Is it gone?" Mondo asked as he started to stand up.

Donnie came over and helped their gecko friend up. "Gone, yes. I have a feeling though that that demon isn't dead." Donnie answered.

They both turned to where they thought Candy was only to see no one there. "Um, where'd the cute lizard girl go?" Mondo asked.

"Axolotl." Donnie corrected automatically. "Her name is Candy and I'm guessing when you showed up she decided she didn't need to watch my back anymore and left. Can't blame her entirely since she is reluctantly working for Fulcanelli's syndicate."

"Bummer." Mondo said, sounding a bit disappointed. "Guess we should catch up with the gang."

Leonardo found the floating demon rather easily. He was almost convinced the thing was searching for him as well. The instant the demon saw the blue masked turtle it threw a fireball at him, Leo quickly drew his katana blades and managed to block it.

Something felt odd to him, and the next thing he knew the demon was right in front of him. The demon slammed his fist right into Leo's chest and he sprawled back hard. "Okay, what the hell?" He wondered.

The demon threw another fireball and Leo dodged it. He then ran toward the demon with his katana's in front of him and slashed the demon. It roared and tried to attack Leo but he rolled under the attack.

Leo turned around to attack the demon again. One minute he was ready to slash at him again and that same odd feeling came again and then the demon was farther away and he had to roll out of the way quickly to avoid another fireball. "What is going on here?" Leo wondered again.

"This demon, called a Hell hunter, is slowing time down." He heard a girl behind him say. He turned to see the mutant female turtle Aaliyah standing there with her bunrei's in her hands. "It doesn't affect me," She moved her right hand a little, causing the metal bracelet to move a little. "Because of this."

"If I have to defeat both of you to keep the people of the city safe, that's what I'll do." Leo promised the white masked turtle as he raised his katana's to face her. The demon, despite not having the legs of its two demonic counterparts, still readied a shoulder ram attack.

Aaliyah saw the Hell Hunter rushing toward the blue masked turtle and she leapt up and intercepted the demon, slashing her way down the demon's muscular body with her bunrei. It recoiled in pain and tried to swipe at the female turtle but was not quick enough as she had to jump backwards from the demon so as not to get burned by the fireballs that rotated around its lower body. She landed beside Leo.

"Look, if I had a choice I wouldn't be fighting you guys." Aaliyah told Leo as she again indicated the bracelet. "This thing makes sure I don't have that choice against Fulcanelli, Hector and Gregory. But these demons are fair game when he's not around. So let's say we agree to worry about the Hell Hunter for now and worry about us later."

Leo hesitated just a bit at the suggestion. He wanted that same arrangement with Karai and that turned out pretty horribly until she learned he was telling the truth about Shredder and Splinter all along. Still, it was better than a two on one situation. "Alright, so how do we defeat this thing?" He asked her.

"Not sure. Brute force is probably the only thing we can use to at least drive it back." Aaliyah answered. "But I don't know how to make you immune to the time slowing thing it does."

Leo glanced down at his swords. "Time slowing." He repeated and then he smiled. "I think I have an idea." He told her. "I just need to know when it's doing that again."

Aaliyah glanced at it. "I think it's getting ready." She told him.

Leo activated the enchantments that were placed on his katana to counter the time slowing smoke bomb used by Chein Khan's Golden ninjas. He wasn't sure that this would do the trick considering the difference but it was worth a shot. And it payed off as he could see the demon coming toward the two turtles.

"See it?" Aaliyah asked the blue masked turtle.

"I see it." Leo answered the white masked turtle. "So, let's show it what kind of double team we can give it."

Both turtles leapt at the Hell Hunter, Leo slashing at the right side of the demon and Aaliyah slashing at the left side of the demon. Of course Leo's swords did a bit more damage since the blades were bigger but when they pulled back away from it; the demon didn't seem to care about the four bleeding gashes on it.

"Damn it." Aaliyah cursed. "This thing is pretty bulky. It would be hard to actually stab into this thing, and even if we did I don't think it would go deep enough."

"We'll figure this out Aaliyah." Leo reassured the female turtle, who was technically his and his family's enemy, but he didn't want to worry about that now. "We have too."

The Hell Hunter readied another fireball and even got ready to hurl it at the two turtles when a roar erupted from behind and before the demon could see what it was, an enormous weight fell upon its back.

"What?" Aaliyah gasped, kind of afraid to see the giant alligator mutant on the demons back.

Leo was elated. "Leatherhead, great timing." The blue masked turtle complimented.

Leatherhead made sure the demon fell to the ground. "We must get rid of this thing quickly, before it strikes back." The mutant gator stated.

"More than you know." Aaliyah said. "Unless I miss my guess, unlike Leonardo and I, you are not immune to this demon's time slowing effect."

"Not true." Leo said as he turned one of his katana around and tossed it toward Leatherhead. "Use that. It will not only give immunity," He looked to Aaliyah as he said and smiled. "But Leatherhead might have the strength to cut through that demon."

Aaliyah returned his smile, and the blue masked turtle was absolutely sure this girl, turtle or not, was both enthusiastic and beautiful, a trait that he would find admirable under other circumstances. Just as he had with Karai. "I think we better give your friend the diversion he needs to get the job done."

No sooner said than the Hell Hunter rose. He swiped at Leatherhead but the mutant gator dodged the attack. Both turtles ran forward and slashed at the demon with their bladed weapons. It turned its attention to them. The katana looked rather small in the giant mutant gator's hand and in fact it felt like nothing to him. With a roar Leatherhead brought the katana down on the Hell Hunter with all of his strength. Even with that he couldn't get more than about halfway through its head.

"We did it." Leo said happily. "Nothing could have survived that."

They were all rather unpleasantly shocked as it recoiled but still stood for a moment. It then vanished, the katana falling to the ground. "Is that a pentagram where that demon stood a moment ago?" Aaliyah asked, kind of freaked out.

Leo went over and picked up his katana, surprised to not even see blood on his weapon. "Bizarre." He murmured to himself then looked to Aaliyah. "It's a pentagram alright."

"I'm thinking that the demon's my 'boss' is toting around might be worse than anything this dog guy I've heard about could possibly be packing." Aaliyah mused as she placed her bunrei's in her belt.

Leo turned to face the mutant female turtle, with Leatherhead behind him. The mutant gator was waiting for the blue masked turtle to make the decision on what to do. "Speaking of your boss." Leo stated.

Aaliyah sighed a bit. "I hate to fight and run, but…" She started and with that she dropped a smoke bomb, quickly disappearing before Leo could stop her.

Raph watched Slash jump down after the last demon. That left him on the roof to recover his sais. He was about to go join his friend when he heard footsteps and turned to see Hector coming up the stairs. "You know, as much as I want to beat you down again, I have other fish to filet first." The red masked turtle stated.

"I'd like to see that." Hector laughed. "Then again, you do realize that with my boss's magical assistance, the demons have done what they have done because of me."

"You really need to just stop breathing." Raph commented.

Hector laughed again. "I think you'll be taking that honor first, reptile." He replied.

"Alright, fine." Raph said. "You asked for this beating then." He ran toward the man, intent on making it a simple fight by kicking him down the stairs. He was surprised to see that as he was getting closer Hector shifted from man to a large crab, and the red masked turtle ran into the hard shell. He fell to the ground. "What the hell?"

Hector laughed and shifted into a human again. "I wasn't about to fight you again without making sure I was prepared." He then seemed to vanish, as if a ghost. "Those girls were supposed to be the freaks to stop the freaks, but they're too weak to do what needs to be done."

Raph tried to attack where he thought Hector was but missed, then got kicked in the back of the knee for his trouble. "So now I'll do what they couldn't do, starting with you." Hector finished.

"We'll see about that." Raph warned and tried to kick behind him but no one was there. "Show yourself, Hector. Stop being such a coward."

Hector appeared in front of him, this time looking like rhinoceros very similar to Rocksteady. "Keep up turtle. You have too if you think you can ever hope to impress a shallow girl like Jennifer." He mocked and then slammed his horn hard into Raph's face. Raph felt some blood and swore he managed to break his nose.

"I said it before, I say it again. You don't know the first thing about Jennifer, not really." Raph countered and kicked Hector in the stomach. Hector growled before turning into a wolf and then leapt at Raph, knocking him to the ground.

Hector then shifted from the rhino to a gorilla, though far bigger than one should ever be. "You King Kong now?" Raph questioned, feeling a little blurry.

"Worse." Hector growled and slammed his fist hard into Raph's chest, sending him flying again. He swore a couple of ribs cracked and wondered if the pain he was feeling now was close to how Jennifer felt from the broken ribs she had had when they rescued her that night.

Hector laughed as he started toward Raph. The turtle tried to stop him and being a large gorilla now he broke Raph's arm with a vicious and clean snap. Then he slammed his fist into Raph's head. "Now I'm more than human. With all the DNA I mixed into the mutagen I took, I'm basically like a chameleon now."

Slash matched the demon strength to strength and then used his mace to again slam it into the demon's chest cavity, and this time it disappeared in the same yellow light. Slash swore for a second there was a pentagram indent in the ground before he wondered where Raph was. He looked up just in time to see a large gorilla thing holding Raph in his arms. "Let him go!" Slash demanded as he began to leap up to the new mutant holding his friend and former owner. Just as Hector threw the unconscious Raphael off the roof.

Casey and Mikey were surprised to see Pigeon Pete at the lair. He had apparently decided to act as protection for the two girls and Splinter if something were to happen. Rockwell of course knew about it.

"Did you stop the big demon thing?" April asked.

"Sure did Red." Casey answered and started to tell her about the blind demon and what they did to stop it.

Not long afterwards Donnie and Mondo Gecko came back to the lair. Mondo was boasting about how he helped Donnie against the demon. They had decided to refrain from mentioning Candy's assistance until the others had come back.

Leo and Leatherhead came not long after that. Leo told them what had happened, including the nice bonus that their enchanted weapons worked to stop all forms of time slowing in case something other than the Golden's and the Hell Hunter used it.

Afterwards they both got into how Candy had helped Donnie and Mondo while Aaliyah had helped Leo and Leatherhead.

"They don't seem to be so bad after all." Mikey said.

Jennifer nodded. "The control my father has over others is very powerful. I'm afraid that most people don't know how to stand up against it. If we don't help them soon and they keep resisting my father, I'm afraid something horrible might happen to them." She said.

"If only this gang war thing would happen already." Casey said. "I bet we could send them all packing and free all three of the girls, if we count Karai of course."

Jennifer looked around worriedly. "Why hasn't Raph come back yet?" She asked.

"Should we go make sure he and Slash defeated their demon, Hell Hunter, whatever?" Mikey asked Splinter.

Their sensei was about to tell them to go and find their brother and friend when they heard Slash yell out, "Help! Donnie! Splinter! Anyone!" They turned to see Slash holding an unconscious Raphael in his arms. They could see blood on his face and behind his head as well as on his left leg. "His shell is cracked, and I don't know what else."

"My son." Splinter gasped.

"Oh god…" Casey whispered, shocked to see his friend looking like that.

"Raph." Mikey gasped as Leo went to help Slash. "Dude, even Leo didn't look that bad after his encounter with the Foot after the invasion."

"Get him in my lab." Donnie said urgently. "I'll get the first aid stuff ready, and hope that's enough." He ran quickly toward his lab, shaking just a bit.

April was stunned herself for just a moment and felt as if she were going to cry. Then she realized she did hear crying and she turned to see Jennifer was doing what she felt like. She quickly put her arms around her and lead her to the couch, where they both sat down without realizing it. Then the red head's eyes misted over too.

Will Raph be okay, can he even be okay? How will the turtles find out what happened? Can Hector be stopped? What could be worse than the Hell Hunters and are they even gone? Stay tuned to find out.


	15. Reflection

Disclaimer: I don't own TMNT; if the character appears in the show I don't own them either.

"How's Raph doing?" Mikey asked Donnie and Splinter as they came out of Donnie's lab.

"Master Splinter was able to get Raph's shell into place after being knocked loose." Donnie started. Mikey nodded in acknowledgement, his shell having had to be placed again after it happened to him, the most recent being against Tiger Claw when they tried to lead him away from the lair after Karai tried to trap them before learning Splinter was her father.

"One step in the right direction." Casey said, finding his mind drifting to the first time had worked with Raph as they had pursued the Footbot that had discovered the turtles, each determined to stop it from taking that information to Karai and the Foot, which was when they had truly gained each other's respect.

"Raph's arm was a clean break so I was able to reset it. It'll be sore for the next couple of days though. I was able to also reset Raph's broken nose. He did lose quite a lot of blood and I have him currently undergoing a transfusion." Donnie continued, not bothering to point out that given his condition that would be the least of his problems. "We wrapped his ribs too; they'll heal after a couple weeks recuperation time."

"Good thing you've had us donating pints of our blood every week for the last fifteen years." Leo noted dryly. "But how is he?" Leo asked. "Outside of that physical stuff."

Donnie sighed a bit and rubbed the back of his head. "I wish I knew what to tell you there. The good news is that the back of his head wasn't as bad as it looked. My hypothesis is that it was actually cut open during the fight he had with that gorilla thing Slash described, not as a result of being tossed off the stadium roof."

"So no brain damage then." April guessed. It was one of the only times where Mikey wouldn't have made a joke about Raph's lack of brains, and though they were all pretty much grateful for that she had to admit it might have broken the tension a little.

"Nothing appreciable." Donnie said.

"Appreciable?" Casey questioned.

"No more damage than what Leonardo may have endured after the Shredder's assault during the invasion." Splinter said.

"Well, that makes me feel a little better." Leo said, only half seriously.

"Is he awake?" Jennifer asked softly, only having just run out of tears to cry for the moment.

"Sorry." Donnie replied as he shook his head.

Jennifer sighed a little. "I have a feeling this is my fault." She confessed.

"There's no way you could be connected to that mutant I saw tossing Raph off the stadium." Slash told the young blonde, not knowing that the mutant was her obsessed stalker Hector.

"Even if it is connected, this is still not your fault." Splinter said as he came over and placed a comforting hand on Jennifer's shoulder. "You are responsible for no one person's actions save your own."

"I shouldn't have gone after that Hell Hunter thing on my own." Slash commented. "I should have stayed with Raphael until we could have gone after it together."

"This isn't your fault either Slash." Leo reassured the large black masked turtle, which was a strange notion to him considering he was only now starting to trust him. "You had no reason to think that would happen and we were all sent to stop the Hell hunter demons. If you hadn't it might have hurt more innocents."

"All of you must stop blaming yourselves for this right now." Splinter stated softly, but with a force behind his voice that would brook no argument. "None of you could have anticipated it and none of you are responsible for it. What matters now is taking the time to recover and decide our next move."

"What next move?" Casey asked. "We're down a fighter in a small band against much larger bands."

"That doesn't mean we just give up Casey." April reminded him. She found herself thinking about when they had infiltrated TCRI and the Kraang captured her. Raph had come to rescue her and she had half seriously joked she'd never live it down, and he had told her they'd all been there.

"I'm not saying we give up Red." Casey snapped then took a deep breath. "Sorry." April nodded her understanding and he continued. "I'm just saying how do we recover from this when we have the smallest numbers in the first place."

"Raph would say we just suck it up and deal with it." Mikey lamented a little sadly. Leo placed a hand over his youngest brother's in comfort.

April watched Donnie turn and go into his lab. A moment later she followed him to see he had just checked on the transfusion process and was now toying a bit with a pair of goggles. She glanced at Raph, seeing his eyes closed and his face without the red mask he wore. She remembered when the creature Mikey called The Creep had drained Raph of his mutagen and just after Donnie had restored him the youngest turtle and freaked seeing him without his mask, making her wonder just how often they removed their masks. "Are you okay Donnie?" She asked the purple masked turtle.

Any other time he would have probably been more excited that their red headed friend was paying him a bit of personal attention, but now it was all but non-existent. "I guess." Donnie said softly. "I'm just worried about Raph. He's the toughest of us and this mutant did this to him. It hasn't been that long since we were worrying about Leo after being attacked like this and now we're worrying about Raph."

"I know how you feel." April said softly as she came and sat next to him, wrapping an arm around Donnie's shoulder. "Raph looks worse than Leo did if possible. At least Leo didn't have anything broken, and he wasn't bleeding and…" She started to cry softly and the purple masked turtle turned around and the two embraced each other. After a minute or so she forced herself to stop and tried to distract them both. "What is that you were toying with anyway?" She kept one arm around Donnie.

Donnie likewise still held April's free hand as he moved his other hand to the goggles. "It's a pair of infrared goggles I've been developing. There just isn't much of an opportunity to test them out. Most of our enemies aren't invisible or anything after all."

"I'm surprised you haven't developed and invisibility suit or something like that." April said with a smile, only half joking.

Donnie smiled a little, under other circumstances he might have laughed a little too. "Not a bad idea actually." The purple masked turtle conceded.

In the main lair Mikey had gone to the kitchen to get some pizza but was having a hard time eating. "What if Raph never gets to eat pizza again?" He wondered.

"I promise you Raphael will recover, my friend." Leatherhead said softly to the youngest turtle. "It is only a matter of time."

"Yeah, but how much?" Mondo wondered softly. "The longer it takes, the better the odds that something will be wrong."

"If I can pull through what I did when Shredder and his goons attacked me, Raph can pull through this." Leo said to them. "He's stronger and tougher than I am."

"You think so?" Jennifer asked Leo.

The blue masked turtle nodded. "I'm more focused and disciplined. But Raph has the strength out of all of us." He answered.

"But that took three months." Mikey said quietly. "Is that how long it will take Raph? Or will it take longer?"

"Three months." Jennifer echoed softly, finding the idea that she wouldn't hear Raph's voice or feel his body warmth against her for at least that long hard to bear.

"He always thought that should make him the leader, and those are good qualities to have. But he cares more about all our safety more than he cares about his own." Leo reflected gently as he looked toward Donnie's lab where Raph was.

Mikey nodded a bit. "Yeah, I remember he was kind of lost when we fought Snakeweed that second time, just after you had gone off and first met Karai." He commented.

"It opened up Raphael's eyes as to what it means to be a leader and fully admitted that he needed Leonardo back with them." Splinter added quietly to them.

Jennifer took a deep breath. "So how can we increase our numbers then?" She asked.

"If only we find Karai so that you and April could help her." Mikey mused.

"I am not sure they are ready for that yet even if Shredder would send Karai out on her own now that he suspects we can get to her." Splinter said.

"Hey, what about the axolotl girl?" Mondo asked. It wasn't hard for Jennifer to know why that interested him though. "And that turtle girl you guys say is working with her too?"

"Why are they working with one of our enemies anyway?" Pigeon Pete asked as Donnie and April emerged from his lab.

Donnie quickly explained about the forced control due to the bracelets on each of the mutant female's wrists as April went to sit next to Jennifer again, offering whatever comfort she could to her friend. "If only Candy had stayed around long enough for me to mention getting it off for her." He lamented.

Leo nodded in agreement. "I should have said something to Aaliyah about that too instead of trying to lead into Fulcanelli's using them." He said. "A simple katana blade to the bracelet would have done the trick."

"From what you've said I can concur with your hypothesis that these girls are not true enemies." Rockwell commented. "But how can anyone be sure that just because they are not enemies that they will remain allies when freed?"

"We can't prove that." Leatherhead agreed but added, "But from what I have seen from Aaliyah I suspect she will fight with us against any enemy because that would be the honorable, the right thing, to do."

Leo nodded. "I think so too." He said.

"Hey, I think if I can fight, then she can fight too." Mondo said. "Will she stay around? I don't know…I kind of hope so."

"She did fight that Hell Hunter at the power plant before I got there, and stuck around with me to help even though she didn't have too." Donnie supplemented. "And she's not a bad shot either."

"But unless we find them alone again like you two did," Jennifer started as she looked to Leo and Donnie. "We'd still have to fight my father, his top guys, and whatever demons he chooses to summon all while being down Ra…one man."

"She is correct." Splinter relented. "Pursuing them intentionally is not an option."

"Even with all of us here, we still need to all be together to be our strongest." April noted. "Just as we were when we came back to take New York from the Kraang. We didn't even know we'd get a few extra members." She looked to each of the Mutanimals and then Mondo Gecko.

"I know this is stupid." Jennifer said. "But what if we did what my father did and steal some mutagen and make more mutants ourselves?"

April shook her head. "Yeah, not a good idea. Sure we might wind up with some good mutants but we could also be the cause of more problems." She said.

"When I first became a mutant I caused problems for Raph and the turtles, which was not my intent when I drank some mutagen." Slash added. "I can confirm it's too dangerous."

"I thought so." Jennifer admitted. "It's just it seems Aaliyah and Candy came out so well…"

"They were human before the mutation." Donnie mused. "We don't know about Candy's background but we know Aaliyah's is actually rather similar to ours from a discipline standpoint as a martial artist. That might make a difference."

"But not one worth exploring, taking a chance on." Splinter reminded them all. "We could just as easily create a rogue like Spiderbytez or Snakeweed. Or a direct enemy like the Rat King was."

"It almost sounds like a suggestion Raph would have made though." Mikey ventured and gave Jennifer a small smile. "If that makes you feel any better."

"A little maybe." The blonde conceded.

"Too bad we can't get in contact with Napoleon and the others." Mikey said. "An army of frogs would be really great to have right now."

"You're right." Leo agreed. "That would be a brilliant suggestion if we could pull it off."

"A non-Dimension X smart moment." Mikey said, slightly elated. "Booyakasha."

"Man, there has to be something we can do to help Raph recover." Casey said as he stood up to pace nervously. "I can't imagine days or months without Raph being around. Or maybe even longer…"

Jennifer had to fight back the tears that were threatening to fall again. April squeezed her hand gently, having a good idea about how the blonde was feeling.

"Do you think you could get any headway with Raph, like you did with Master Splinter when we came back to the city and found him all primal?" Mikey asked April.

"I don't know, I could try." April admitted.

"I think that should wait a little until we can be sure Raph is strong enough mentally to handle that." Donnie said. "Right now it would be a miracle just for him to wake up, let alone a psychic strain like that."

"One thing I'd like to do is hunt down that mutant." Slash said with a menacing growl. "Teach that monster a lesson or two."

"That wouldn't be a good idea." Leo said. "We don't know the extent of its abilities and if it could take out Raph it could take out any of us."

"Not if we Mutanimals go as a team." Slash declared and looked to them. "In fact I say we do exactly that."

Pete and Leatherhead looked uncertain though of course they would follow. Rockwell looked as if he had thoughts about arguing against that course of action while Mondo Gecko seemed ready to remind him that technically he was not really a Mutanimal and didn't have to do anything as rash as what Slash was suggesting.

"We can't afford any more injuries, especially if this gang war is imminent." Leo reminded as he stood up to face the black masked turtle.

"We're not under your command Leonardo." Slash stated as he turned to face the blue masked turtle. "We can do what we want, and you can't stop us unless you really want to start a fight."

Both of the turtles were reaching for their weapons and Splinter was about to break it up but didn't get the chance. "Stop it!" Jennifer yelled at them. "This isn't what Raph would want! He wouldn't want his brothers and his friends going at each other over this! He wouldn't want anyone else getting hurt or maybe even killed by the same thing that did this to him! He would want us to stay united, to stay a team, and if you two opened your eyes for a moment you would know that too!" April saw the tears again streaming down her face and she wrapped an arm around her.

"Jennifer is right." Splinter said now. "This is not what we need, this is not what Raphael needs."

Slash sighed. "You're right, Master Splinter, Jennifer." He relented and looked to Leo. "Sorry about that. It's just…I remember how Raph was with me when I was just his pet turtle. I may be more than that now, but I still remember. To see him like that, to think I was there and should have been able to do something, it's…it's hard."

Leo nodded. "I understand." He reassured the bigger turtle. "That's the burden of leadership, it doesn't matter what team you're leading. I'm not the Mutanimals leader but I am the Mutanimals friend, and if this were one of your people I'd feel the same way."

"I think Slash may be onto something." Casey said. "I mean, not about splitting up but about trying to find the mutant that did this. Make sure it doesn't do this to anyone else. And it might make us feel better too."

"Revenge is never a good thing." Splinter reminded them and sighed a bit. "Though releasing pent up frustration and anger is not always a bad thing. But if in the end you all choose to pursue this creature you must all think about the steps carefully. Jennifer is right that adding another injured person or even a death to the situation will not help anything."

"If only we really knew what this mutant was." April mused quietly. "Then we would know what we're dealing with."

Leo nodded. "Raph is brash but smart." He said as he paced a little. "A gorilla mutant couldn't have done that to him without Raph figuring out the best way to handle it." He looked to Slash. "Are you sure he was the only thing up on the stadium roof after you pursued the Hell Hunter?"

"As sure as I can be." Slash replied.

"Unless it wasn't a gorilla mutant." Rockwell suggested. "What if it were a blend of more than one creature?"

"But we already saw that when Karai messed with the Kraang lab and ended up unintentionally making Justin." Mikey replied.

Donnie caught onto what Rockwell was thinking. "But that was an uncontrolled circumstance." He reminded his youngest brother. "What if whoever this thing was blended the DNA first and then used a controlled amount of mutagen, like Fulcanelli had to have done with Candy and Aaliyah?" He proposed.

"Precisely. A more accurate blending of both DNA and mutagen could create more stable reaction than what apparently had happened to make this Justin your brother is speaking of." Rockwell said.

"Then my father was responsible for that mutant, just as he had to be responsible for those three Hell Hunters and that blind demon thing in the park." Jennifer said quietly and sighed. "So it is my fault."

"You're not responsible for your father's actions." April reminded her friend gently yet sternly.

"Does that mean that mutant thing was that Hector creep?" Casey asked.

"It would make sense." Leo admitted. "Hector has basically been targeting Raph since he found out that Jennifer is close to him." The statement brought a flinch to the blonde's lovely features.  
"And then the last time we saw him Raph beat him down pretty soundly."

"Wait, so does that mean Aaliyah and Candy played you guys?" Casey asked the blue and purple masked turtles.

"I don't think so." Donnie said. "Candy could care less about who they want her to target. She just seems to want to avoid their wrath."

"And Aaliyah doesn't want to be our enemy, she just doesn't see that she has a choice." Leo added. "Whatever plan Hector and Fulcanelli had, I don't think the girls had any part in it."

"Knowing Raph, he would find that a small comfort though." Casey pointed out.

Jennifer stood up and stretched a little, trying to release the tension from her body. Then she looked at Donnie. "Is it okay if I go inside your lab and check on Raph?" She asked.

Donnie nodded. "Sure, go ahead." He answered.

"Do you want anyone to go with you?" April asked her.

Jennifer shook her head. "I'd rather do it alone." She said. The red head nodded and she walked into the lab. It was a bit odd for her since despite living with the turtles for weeks she had never seen the inside of the lab, and everyone else had drifted in and out of here at least once since she had lived there.

She glanced at the garage door, knowing parked outside was both the Shellraiser and the Party Wagon. Right now the lab also held the Stealth bike since Donnie had been upgrading the armor on it. She remembered Mikey once telling her that Raph had called the Stealth bike his thing and wondered why he had decided that. She had to resist the feeling she would never get to ask him that.

She saw Raph lying there on the cot, the empty bag beside him. She made a note to tell Donnie the transfusion was done when she went back to the living room. Right now she sat on her knees by Raphael and took his hand, sighing softly.

"I heard that those in comas can still hear everyone around them." Jennifer said softly. "Days before I lost my mother, the cancer had spread to her brain and she had fallen into a coma. I talked to her for hours those last days hoping…I don't know, I guess that somehow she would recover." She looked down. "She never did, so she couldn't tell me whether she had heard me talking to her during those last days."

Jennifer looked to the doors where she knew the rest of Raph's family and friends, which she supposed meant they were hers too, where out there talking softly as well. Each of them had one ultimate thought on their minds; how long would Raph recover. No one wanted to deal with the idea that he might not.

"We're all torn up over what happened." Jennifer said as she looked back to Raph's face. "They want to go after the mutant who did this, whoever they might be. Leo and Slash almost came to blows over how to handle it." She reached up with her free hand and stroked Raph's cheek. "Despite everything I've heard I know you and Leo really care for each other. And Slash cares too. He seems to have come a long way since you found him and adopted him but he has never forgotten you."

"Mikey and Donnie are worried too. Mikey can barely eat, and I've been here long enough to know how unusual that is." She took a deep breath. "Donnie and Master Splinter took care of the wounds you got in that fight. You're lucky to have Master Splinter, I wish my father could have been half the father to me that Splinter is to all of you."

She looked up at the ceiling as she went on. "My father, even before my mother died, was never the most attentive. Even then he must have been planning his syndicate and making his demonic contacts. My mother would always be at my gymnastic classes and competitions, right up until she ended up in the hospital. My father was there like maybe once." Jennifer squeezed his hand gently. "I hope you can feel that too, I've never heard if a person in a coma can feel things or not."

Jennifer had to choke back a sob that suddenly rose in her throat. "You have to get better Raph. Your brothers need you, your father needs you, Casey needs you, Slash needs you. Your friends need you." Jennifer stood up and then looked down at Raph. "Raph, I need you." She added, so quietly she wasn't sure Raph could have heard her regardless. "I need you. I love you." She leaned down and pressed her lips gently against the red masked turtle's lips. "Please, please get better soon. " She then turned to go back to the living room and let out a scream.

All of the living room occupants heard that and just as they had gotten up toward the lab it was followed by a loud crashing sound. The sight that greeted them was the garage door smashed through and Jennifer gone.

"What just happened?" Casey questioned, hockey stick in hand.

Donnie ran over to his thankfully undamaged computer and quickly called up the security footage. "Here." He said and they all crowded around to see that Jennifer had turned around and had screamed because she had a big bull like mutant standing in front of her that hadn't been there moments before. He had grabbed her and then charged the garage door, leaving the lab in the condition that they had found it in.

"That's not the same mutant that I saw on the stadium." Slash noted.

"No, but if our theory is right that mutant is really a shape changer, kind of like a chameleon." Rockwell replied.

"We have to go after him and rescue Jennifer." April said as she looked at the guys. "Raph would never forgive us if we didn't."

"Go then." Splinter told the guys. "April and I will stay here and watch over Raphael and make sure nothing else is here."

"No." April objected. "I'm going too. I can't just stay here right now. I've already failed one friend, I can't stand by and hope I don't fail another." She took a deep breath. "I need to do something."

Splinter nodded his understanding. "Go, all of you. Bring Jennifer home."

The Turtles, the Mutanimals, and their two human allies started to after them, Donnie mentioning they would follow the homing device in Jennifer's T-phone. They could only hope they could get to her before she got hurt or worse.

Will our heroes be able to rescue their newest friend? Are they walking into a trap? How can they help the two female mutants? And what will become of Raphael? Stay tuned to find out.


	16. Revival

Disclaimer: Don't own TMNT; if it's not on the show then I do own it.

"Raph, I need you." She had said, so quietly she wasn't sure Raph could have heard her regardless. Hector had heard her though, watching her and the others ever since he had gone invisible to follow the big black masked turtle named Slash to their enemies' lair.

"I need you. I love you." She had said and leaned down and pressed her lips gently against the red masked turtle's lips. This confession and her move enraged him. As far as he was concerned the beautiful blonde in front of him belonged to him, she always had. "Please, please get better soon. " She then turned to go back to the living room and let out a scream as he had become visible again and grabbed her.

In between the time Hector had left with his kidnapped prize and the others had shown up, Raphael's lips had a blue glow on them that quickly seeped into his mouth and down his body.

"He's taking Jennifer to the warehouse district." Donnie told his team mates. "I can't tell which one though."

"That is good enough." Leatherhead told the purple masked turtle. "Once we get to the district I can find her by her scent."

"Wow, that is both creepy and cool." Casey said with a smirk.

The mutant tossed Jennifer onto the floor roughly. She looked up at him. "What did you do to yourself Hector?" She questioned.

The mutant shifted into the form of the man that she quite honestly feared. "And how did you know that it was me?" He asked her.

"Because you would be the only in my father's organization, besides my father himself, who would grab me. And if it were my father he wouldn't have run, he would have released demons to try to kill my friends." Jennifer answered.

"Maybe you're a bit smarter than I ever gave you credit for." Hector smirked. "I always thought you had a few things bigger than your brain after all." He started to pace around her. "I mixed several DNA strands and mutagen to transform myself into a shape shifting mutant. Your little red masked friend called me a chameleon. At least when he was conscious to do so."

Jennifer felt sad, knowing she was right. Raph got hurt by Hector and it was because of the fact she liked him…no, as she had mentioned she loved him. "You did that to him." She said softly.

Hector kicked Jennifer hard in the side so fast she didn't see it coming, especially as distracted as she was. "Of course I did you stupid little girl." He snarled. "And you know why. You just admitted to 'loving' that turtle freak, especially since you could have had me."

Jennifer coughed a bit; glad her ribs were basically healed though it reminded her that her side was still a little sore. "I never wanted you." She reminded him. "I never wanted you near me, I never wanted you to touch me, and I never wanted anything you did to me."

Hector laughed at her. "That could have fooled me." He sneered.

"It did." The blonde replied. "Or really you fooled yourself. Just like you've fooled yourself if you think the others won't come after me. Even though I admit it surprises me to no end, they care about me and wouldn't abandon me."

"After what I did to your 'boyfriend' you can't possibly think I'm not prepared for the rest of the freak squad." Hector retorted. "You can't possibly expect that your father doesn't know about all of this, or about anything else that transpired between you and me for that matter."

Jennifer flinched. She had always suspected all of the abuse she went through hadn't gotten unnoticed by her father, she just assumed it had since it had gone unchallenged. Now having to face the truth first hand was almost more than she could take.

Hector laughed at her. "You really thought he didn't know. I was wrong, you're stupider than I could have ever imagined." He aimed a punch right at her face.

Jennifer blocked the attack just as Master Splinter had taught her, and then used a leg sweep to knock him off his feet, again just as Master Splinter had taught her. She rose, a little shakily. "I won't lie to you. I was afraid of you, I'm still afraid of you and I will probably always be. But I won't let you control me anymore." She stated as she took a fighting stance.

Hector laughed at her. "We'll see what kind of control I can still have over you after I beat you down for your insolence." He ran at her and aimed a kick at her chest. She caught his foot and twisted it, throwing him to the ground.

He rose easily and glared at her. He swung several punches at her, each of which she blocked to the side. She tried to throw a punch of her own but he caught her wrist and flipped her over his back, slamming her onto the ground hard. She wondered if the pain she felt in her back was anything like what the other turtles felt when Raph pulled that move off with his sais.

"Pathetic." Hector gloated and tried to bring his foot down on her face, but the lithe blonde rolled quickly out of the way and flipped back up into a fighting stance, glad that she had the gymnastics background to combine with her ninja training. She moved quickly and gave a vicious side kick to Hector's face. She had hoped to break his nose as he had Raph's, but with no such luck.

"You seem to be a better fighter now than you were the last time I, shall we say, engaged with you." Hector noted with some amusement. "But you're not good enough to take me. Whereas I am good enough to take you, in more ways than one."

"There's been a change of plans, Hector." They heard and both saw the Mutanimals, April, Casey and the turtles (sans Raph) break through one of the doors. That voice had belonged to the blue masked turtle Leo.

"You did find her. Great job Leatherhead." Mikey said to the mutant gator.

"Let her go right now or you'll regret it." Leo stated.

"You're extremely outnumbered." Casey added. "And some enhanced mutant thing or not we can still beat you down together."

Hector laughed. "It would seem that way, wouldn't it?" He questioned. He formed a tentacle from his skin and used it to lash out and wrap it around Jennifer, drawing the blonde close to him, despite her attempts to struggle. "Then again, maybe you should meet the future fate of your red masked brother."

"What does he mean by that?" Mikey wondered. Then came several sounds that almost sounded like a blender and from the shadows emerged over a dozen skeletons like demonic creatures, each of them with a hook for a right hand and they had a mounted launcher on their either of their shoulders.

"Sewer apples." Donnie muttered.

"More demons." Mondo said with a shake of his head.

"Meet the Revenants." Hector told the team. "I've always thought of them as dead warriors who were dusted off, reanimated, retrofitted and then sent out to fight again."

"That is just nasty." April commented.

"We'll take those things out and then deal with you." Leonardo stated as he aimed his katana at Hector. "No one attacks my family and gets away with it."

"We'll just see about that one." Hector decided. "Revenants destroy them all."

"Mutanimals, Turtles, April, Casey." Leo said as he glanced at his team mates. "Let's take these things out, beat Hector and bring Jennifer home." He took a deep breath. "For Raph."

The first thing that happened was the Revenants launched missiles from the shoulder mounted launchers. Rockwell immediately used his psychic powers to divert them away, but they could all see it was a bit of a strain on him.

"Shouldn't those have been easy for you to divert?" Donnie questioned the mutant monkey.

"Under ordinary circumstances yes." Rockwell answered. "But something about them…I suspect that they are modified to be homing missiles."

"So we can't dodge them so easily." Leo said. "We have to stop them from doing that again then."

"Time to move up close then." Slash said and Leo nodded in agreement. The Revenants were already doing so and were really leaving them no choice but it seemed better to go up close than let the demon skeletons use their homing missiles anyway.

Having the size and the strength Leatherhead and Slash were able to tear through the Revenants they were encountering. Pete and Mondo were having a harder time as they didn't have either of those over their demon opponents. Rockwell was forced to take cover and watch the battle, primarily because he had to be prepared to protect the others if the Revenants got off another round of homing missiles.

April did not have the size or strength that Leatherhead and Slash did but she had the speed to dodge their attacks and though it took a minute or two she was able to use her tessen's to take out the Revenants. Casey too did his best but he was finding without a sharp implement to fight with it he wasn't doing anything fatal to the skeletal demons.

It was made harder though overall because Leo, Donnie, and Mikey were more interested in getting to Hector to rescue Jennifer and avenge their brother than worrying about the demons. Leo's katana blades did as much good as any other weapon to deal with the Revenants while Donnie had to transform his bo staff into a Naginata to dispatch of the Revenants. Mikey didn't have the room to do anything different with his nunchuks and so only used his weapons to stun the demons so his two older brothers could take out the demons as they went to their main target.

"When the turtles get over here, they're going to make you pay for what you did to Raph." Jennifer promised Hector, her eyes deadly serious.

Hector still laughed. "If they get to me, which I quite frankly doubt they will, they'll then get taken out just as easily as your red masked lover did." He responded and gave her a glare. "Yes, I saw you kiss him. I'll make sure you pay for that show of affection later."

"Shouldn't we have taken all of these things out by now?" Mondo questioned as he dodged a right hook from one of the Revenants. Luckily at that point Slash came in from behind the skeletal demon and smashed it with his mace.

"Yeah, he's got a good point." Slash agreed. "Rockwell, Donnie, any ideas?"

"Teleporters." Rockwell answered simply. "When we faced the big four legged demon in the park, it wasn't killed, it simply teleported away when it seemed to realize we wouldn't allow it to 'see' anymore."

"Makes sense to me." Donnie agreed as he used the bladed end of his staff to punch through a Revenant as he would have a Foot bot. "That would explain why those spider things were able to ambush us from both sides in the sewers."

April glanced around quickly. "I don't see any indication of how they could be teleporting in." She told them as she then turned to face the next Revenant to approach her. Casey was right by her, basically now providing the same amount of distraction for her that Mikey was providing to his brothers.

"I think the only way that will end is when we take out Hector." Leo stated. "Keep at it team, we'll end this very soon."

Hector laughed. "Not the way you think, turtle. But you are right, it will end soon."

"I'm really getting tired of this guy's laugh." Donnie remarked.

"You and me both, bro." They heard a familiar voice say from a beam on the ceiling. "You and me both."

Hector was shocked, and that inaction seemed to freeze the Revenants. April, Casey, Jennifer, the Mutanimals, and the turtles looked up as well. The blonde gasped as Mikey exclaimed, "Raph!"

Raphael drew his sais, twirled them in his hands and glared down at Hector. "Let her go right now. You have to deal with me, and this time I won't lose." He said. No one could see it from their view but the red masked turtle wore the same pair of goggles that Donnie had been messing with in the lab earlier. He'd learned his lesson from the first fight well.

Before Hector could respond, Jennifer acted. She stepped on his foot hard. The tentacle released her on impulse and Jennifer dashed out of the way, past the turtles but had to stop just short of where her two human friends and the Mutanimals were dealing with the Revenants.

"You're not doing this alone Raph." Leo called up to his red masked brother. "We're going to do this together."

Raph's first impulse was to argue. He was the one taken down badly by this mutant and it should have been his place to avenge it. But he knew his brothers were also probably looking to take out their anger over the attack as well. So he nodded. "Let's do it then bros."

"Revenants finish them off." Hector commanded. "Turtles, it's time to play a game." He then went invisible.

"Ah, shell." Mikey said.

"I don't think so." Raph said with a grin as he lowered the goggles over his eyes. "Leo, to your left, nine o'clock."

Leo reacted immediately, jumping up and delivering a powerful kick, connecting with Hector. He was forced to reappear and he landed on one knee. "Awesome Raph." Leo said.

Raphael leaped down and landed in between Mikey and Donnie. "Ready guys?" He asked.

"Ready." Donnie said.

"Let's do it." Mikey agreed.

Leo kept his eye on the rising mutant shifter. "Nice to have you back, Raph." The blue masked turtle said. "I think I'll let you have the mantle for this fight."

"How kind of you." Raph commented, but the oldest turtle could hear the sincerity behind what were normally sarcastic words. "Move up guys."

Hector jumped up, and higher than a normal human should have been able to do. He formed bat wings and then vanished as he challenged, "Catch me if you can turtles."

Raph only had to look for a moment. "Mikey, up and right at two o'clock." He said.

It did take Mikey just a bit longer than Leo to realize the coordinates his last older brother was giving him but he did get it quick enough to change his nunchuck into a Kusarigama and swung in that direction, hitting the mutant shifter hard.

Hector landed easily, changing his human legs to bull legs. "How are you finding me?" He questioned hotly.

"He's using my infrared goggles." Donnie answered smugly. "You won't be hiding from us now."

"Alright then." Hector said, clearly angered by it but seeing no way around it. "Stealth is out, so let's see you deal with this." His top half changed to that of a gorilla and he kept the bat wings he had used to try to fly at them. He then charged at them.

"Wow, here comes Chameleon." Mikey stated.

"Chameleon?" Leo asked.

"Well he changes his form and goes invisible." Mikey answered.

"Technically a real Chameleon only changes color, not form. That means when all is said and done they don't really go invisible they just blend into their surroundings in order to…" Donnie started to go into a long explanation.

"Can it." Raph ordered. "We have bigger things to worry about than Mikey's being inaccurate."

Leo had to dodge a slash of Hector's wings. He knocked Mikey and Donnie out of the way as he rampaged toward Raph, though the two turtles recovered quickly. Raph jumped up and kicked him in the chest hard, and as the mutant shifter stumbled back Donnie used his bo staff to trip him. Mikey swung the Kusarigama and wrapped him up as he fell the ground.

Jennifer turned and barely dodged a Revenant's right hook. She was able to recover a piece of lead piping to deflect the skeletal demon's follow up attack. She delivered a pretty strong and certainly effective round house kick. "Thank you Master Splinter." She said to herself. The problem of course was that while that would have taken a human out of the fight and might even have stopped a Footbot it meant very little to the demon.

April saw her blonde friend's dilemma and she took one of her tessen and threw it straight at the Revenant, resulting in what would have been a decapitation. The skeletal demon of course faded away into nothing. "Use that to fight." The red head called out. "It seems to require extremely blunt force or sharp ends to take these things out."

Jennifer picked up the tessen. "Got it, and thanks." She responded as she never the less moved closer to the two humans to fight the demons.

All the while Hector shrank himself into a small spider like creature, like a thinner Spiderbytez, and then turned back into his previously chosen mutant form. "You'll have to do better than that." He told the turtles.

"What now?" Mikey asked, looking from Leo to Raph.

"We can't just bind him." Leo said. "We're going to have to knock him out or get him to retreat."

"Or end him." Raph added. Leo glanced at him and he shook his head. "Look Leo, I know how you feel about that but that might be what it takes. We can't forget that he knows where the lair is too."

"Why don't we just see where this fight takes us?" Mikey suggested. A look passed between his two older brothers and they seemed to silently agree to that idea.

The four turtles ran toward him, Mikey and Donnie moving to deliver a double kick. Hector brought his wings up to block the attack and then used his wings to force them away, though the two turtles landed on their feet.

Leo and Raph came in next and each swept a leg out from under him. Both turtles then delivered elbows to his back, which dislodged the wings. They fell to the ground and melted away.

Hector swung his arms out and clocked both of the oldest turtles in the chest but as the mutant shifter started to rise Donnie came over to him and slammed the end blunt end of his bo staff into Hector's face, if he had been a human it would have shattered his nose.

Raph moved in to stab Hector in the back but his sais seemed to hit something solid just in front of his body. "What's this?" The red masked turtle asked.

"He's grown an endoskeleton to act as armor." Donnie answered his older brother.

"Wonderful." Raph groused.

Hector tried to attack Raph and he dodged backwards. Leo came in from behind and kicked him in the small of the back, where the endoskeleton did little good to protect it. As he was bent half backwards Mikey yelled, "Booyakasha!" and kicked him straight in the chin.

Hector fell full on backwards and hit the ground ungracefully. All the Revenants disappeared from where they stood, just barely below overwhelming the three humans and the Mutanimals. Then the mutant shifter gave a sigh, no one could tell what it might have signified, and then much like his wings had moments earlier melted away himself.

"Does that mean we killed him?" Mikey asked his older brothers.

"I don't know." Donnie admitted. "This kind of mutation has never been seen before, the closest ever was Timothy and while his was unintentional Hector did this to himself on purpose, almost basically knowing what he was trying to do."

"Never thought I'd be so happy to hear such geek talk." Raph remarked with a smile. "It's good to hear you bro."

"Good to have you back." Donnie said as the three other turtles came to stand by Raph. Moments later the four brothers embraced one another.

"Does Master Splinter know you're okay?" Leo asked the red masked turtle.

"Yeah." Raph answered softly. "He heard me getting out of that cot and cursing a little when I pulled the needle from that transfusion out of my arm. He was as shocked as all of you were." He looked to Donnie. "By the way, making us give blood every week for years was a pretty lame idea, but here's a big YAY for your lame idea."

Donnie chuckled. "Gee, thanks Raph." He noted.

"I'm so glad you're back bro." Mikey said.

"Me too little brother." He said to his youngest brother as he gently patted the back of his shell. "Me too."

"Raphael, it's good to have you back brother." Slash said as the rest of their team started walking toward them.

"Good to be back, Slash." Raph said to his former pet and now friend. Then he looked to Jennifer. "Hey, pretty girl."

Jennifer only vaguely made sure that April got her other tessen back before she ran to Raphael and threw her arms over his neck, pulling him to her tightly. "Raph." She whispered. "I was so afraid you would never recover. That you would never be okay again."

"How did that happen anyway?" Mondo asked and then hastened to add, "Not that I'm not grateful too."

"Jennifer's powers." April stated suddenly.

"Come again?" Jennifer asked her friend, confused.

Donnie snapped his fingers as it clicked into place for him too. "Remember how Jennifer's ribs and the cuts on her body healed rapidly." He questioned and got nods from Casey and his three brothers. "That was due to Jennifer's rapid healing ability in her body. She must have done the same thing for Raph."

"How could have she done that?" Rockwell asked. "Unless she placed her own blood in the blood bag you were using for the transfusion."

Raph shook his head. "It was simpler than that." He told his brothers. "I remember what happened. She came in and talked to me." He looked to the pretty blonde. "I remember everything she said. And I remember the kiss she gave me on the lips too." He added, causing a slight blush in her cheeks.

"Raph, do you have a girlfriend now?" Mikey teased.

"That means your abilities have grown even further, though apparently not just the psychic ones." April replied, ignoring Mikey.

Jennifer nodded a little at her friend, not quite sure how she felt about that one yet, save for one reasoning right now. She turned to Raph. "You remember what I said, what I did?" Jennifer still had to ask.

Raph nodded. "I do." He reached out and gently ran his fingers down her left cheek. "And I think it's time to do this right." He then leaned down, with Jennifer leaning up to meet him halfway, where they shared a gentle but passionate kiss.

Mikey was about to tease them further but April was quickly there and elbowed him in the side saying, "Hush Mikey." Donnie laughed at that just a little.

"Somehow I figured Donnie would be the first to get a girlfriend, you know what with April and…" The youngest turtle started but got interrupted by Donnie's exclamation of protest to cover up his embarrassment and unseen by anyone else the slight blush in the red head's cheeks now.

Raphael pulled away from Jennifer and looked around at everyone. "I think we better get back to the lair so that way Master Splinter knows we're all okay." He said. The others agreed with that assessment and they all started out of the warehouse, the red masked turtle holding onto Jennifer's hand as they walked.

Splinter was indeed waiting for them when they came back about half an hour later after parting with the Mutanimals, who had their own plaza to work on now that things had settled down for the moment. "I am glad that you found them in time, my son." Splinter said as he approached Raphael and put his hand on the turtle's shoulder. "I did not get the chance to tell l you how glad I am that you are alright." He looked to the blonde girl that he noticed was holding hands with Raphael now. "And I am glad to see that you are alright as well."

"Thank you sensei." Jennifer said respectively as she bowed a little.

"It was Hector." Leo told their father. "He's mutated himself with so much DNA that he's like a shape shifter."

"The Chameleon." Mikey added in what he thought was a menacing tone, shaking his hands for effect.

"Fulcanelli is indeed becoming a most dangerous opponent." Splinter mused as they all started to walk back toward the living room. "He now has three mutants under his command, even if two of them are reluctant. He has seemingly vast armies of demons at his command, and I am certain he has to have people working with him as well."

"He does." Jennifer confirmed as she and Raph sat together on a bean bag chair that Mikey had recently brought into the living room. "I don't know where they've been since the last we saw of them was when I first came into town." Each of the turtles could recall the first night they had seen four goons chasing Jennifer down the alley, who had had broken ribs and had been stabbed on the other side.

"Master Splinter," Leo broached. "With all due respect things keep getting more dangerous. If Jennifer is to have a better chance of surviving what is to come she will need a weapon."

Splinter nodded. "I have considered that Leonardo." He told his eldest son and then looked at the rest of the turtles and their human allies. "As April can attest to it took months before she had a weapon, and years before each of you possessed weapons. But those were different times and different circumstances, even for you." This he said as he looked at the red head.

"So she's going to get a weapon?" Raph asked.

"Yes." Splinter answered. "Tomorrow we will have her select a weapon. Tonight I believe we should all take some time to rest, and to enjoy the fact that Jennifer is unharmed and Raphael is with us again healthy." He frowned just a little. "Though I am at a loss as to how that happened so easily."

Donatello began to explain to their master and father his theory on what happened as he had to the others at the warehouse after Hector had been defeated. Meanwhile Raph turned to Leo. "So, are you more jealous of the fact I have a girlfriend first or that my girlfriend could heal me from practically death's door?" He questioned jokingly.

"Well the near instantaneous healing would have been nice a few months ago when I was recovering at the farmhouse." Leo responded to his first younger brother good naturedly, knowing he was joking. "As for the other, nah. One thing you two just taught me is that it can happen to all of us if we just wait."

Raph laughed and the two fist bumped. Leo then got up and started over to their father the purple masked turtle.

"So, if Jennifer can heal anyone now, does that mean it has to happen with a kiss?" Casey asked than just to tease his best friend he added, "Because if that's the case, maybe I should find a way to get badly hurt." Raph tossed an empty soda can at him and the vigilante laughed as he dodged it.

"Actually I'd be willing to bet now that Jennifer knows she can heal others, if she has the strength to do so at the time she could probably heal just by touch now." Donatello speculated. "Though I would hope we would never have to find out for sure."

"I wouldn't count on that." Leo warned them all. "Before this is all over we may be testing that out, and that assumes you're right." He looked around at the room. "Truth is we can't even guarantee we'll all walk away from this alive, and I don't think even Jennifer's expanded healing powers could change that."

With that grim comment having been said, Mikey and Casey decided to get some pizzas and then left the lair.

"I heard everything you said." Raph said to Jennifer as he took one of her hands in one of his and started to gently stroke her hair with his other hand. "Truth is a lot of it was kind of sad. Some of it was kind of nice, and some of it was shocking."

Jennifer looked at Raph curiously. "Shocking?" She repeated questioningly.

"Yeah." Raph confirmed. "You see, before April and Casey we hadn't even had much contact with humans. We were taught that the outside world would be afraid of us, even those like the police who should be our allies." He took a deep breath and Jennifer waited patiently for him to continue. "The thing is we'd be growing up and watching TV and all that and most of it seemed like an illusion."

"Why?" Jennifer asked.

"We'd watch something where the guy gets the girl at the end and someone, usually Mikey, would comment about what it would be like to get a first kiss or to hold hands or something like that." Raph answered as he again stroked her hair. "Or even doing something like that. Another, usually me but sometimes Donnie, would remind the others that we're mutants and most people would find us scary and couldn't even be friends with us, let alone something more."

"Until April and Casey." Jennifer said.

"Actually just April." Raph corrected her. "We didn't meet Casey until over a year later after her. Donnie saw her and he," The red masked turtle lowered his voice so as not to embarrass anyone as that wasn't the point right now. "Said he fell right in love with her. We'd all kind of give him a hard time about but I was probably the worst. I would remind him that April could never see him that way."

"I'm not so sure about that one." Jennifer mused quietly, which drew a surprised look from Raph but he chose not to pursue that one. It was between Donnie and April rather anything would ever come to be, and if Jennifer wanted to talk to her friend about it for whatever purpose that was between the two girls.

"It wasn't just Donnie though." Raph clarified. "I say that and I'm thinking that for me too."

"You're wrong Raphael." Jennifer told him gently but firmly. "There are girls out there who, given a bit of time, could see right through your outer shells…no pun intended." The two of them shared a small smile at the kind of lame joke. "To see the good hearts, minds, and souls within." The blonde reached up with her free hand and gently touched the side of Raphael's face and then let it run down Raphael's arm to rest atop the hand that held hers. "I see you, all of you, for what you are. And I am yours as long as you want me."

"You have no idea what it means for me to hear you say that one." Raph told her and leaned forward to gently kiss her on the lips again, then pulled back and whispered, "No idea."

"I'm going to get some sodas from the kitchen and some plates for dinner." Jennifer told Raphael and then kissed him again briefly on the lips before getting up and starting toward the kitchen.

Raph then remembered he still had the goggles Donnie had been working on. He took them off and called out for his purple masked brother. When he looked over Raph tossed him the goggles. "They work great Don, thanks for the assist." He said and smiled just a bit. "Oh, and don't give up hope with April there. One thing I just learned today is that anything is possible for us, even girlfriends."

That elicited a small smile on the purple masked turtle's face.

Is Hector really gone? Is Jennifer right about April's feelings and can this new relationship encourage anyone else? What's in store for the heroes in a half shell next? Stay tuned to find out.


	17. Scaly Experiment Gone Awry

Disclaimer: Don't own TMNT. Really if you see in the series then I don't own it. This is the next seemingly obligatory standalone that usually goes into a series, but hope you enjoy anyway.

Just after midnight an alarm went off in the warehouse that Fulcanelli's syndicate had set up shop. Aaliyah, Gregory, Hector, and Candy followed the alarm to the lab; the two female mutants kept their distance from the two men.

"What happened in here?" Candy questioned as she saw the smashed wall.

Aaliyah looked around a bit and gasped a little when she saw the broken cage. "What was in that?" She questioned.

Gregory shrugged a little. "I think it was that snake that we had given mutagen to." He answered. "The boss also worked some hypnotic magic of some kind over it."

Both mutant girls stared incredulously at him. "What kind of snake?" The mutant turtle girl demanded coldly.

"It was a cobra." Hector snapped at her. He wanted nothing more than to put these two failed mutants down but Fulcanelli disagreed with it.

"Aren't those like really illegal?" Candy questioned. Aaliyah didn't remind her friend that most of what they did was basically illegal. It was one of the reasons she hated these damn bracelets that kept the two of them under Fulcanelli's command.

"We have to go after it and stop it before it hurts someone." Aaliyah stated as she reached for one of her bunrei.

"You will do no such thing." They heard Fulcanelli command behind them.

"What?" Both mutant girls questioned.

"Leave it alone." He repeated. "I want to see what kind of havoc it causes and what our enemies choose to do to stop it, if any." By that he basically meant the turtles. He would bet anything that neither the Foot nor the Goldens would step in unless they had absolutely no choice, and Yen was a factor he couldn't predict but would guess he too would avoid it.

With that said Hector and Gregory followed Fulcanelli out of the makeshift lab. Candy looked to Aaliyah sheepishly. "I guess…I guess there's nothing we can do." She said quietly. She hated the idea despite the fact she wasn't really a fighter, but getting shock punishment from Fulcanelli was not something she wanted to have to incur more than already seemed to happen.

Aaliyah glanced out at the hole and shook her head. "No." She stated. "He won't do anything about it, but I will." She looked to her axolotl friend. "I need you to cover for me though."

Candy bit her lip. Even that could get her in trouble; never mind what it might do to Aaliyah. After a moment though she nodded. "Go. I'll try to hold the fort." She promised. With that the mutant turtle girl ran out the hole and into the night.

Over eight hour passed and the sun had risen on a new day, the world unaware of what had transpired in that warehouse laboratory. April and Casey picked Jennifer up from the lair so that they could go shopping for food for her, the turtles, and Splinter. When Jennifer really thought about it, she realized this was the second time she had been above ground in New York without the turtles, the first being their July 4th celebration.

It seemed Casey read her thoughts. "Don't really get out much without the guys, huh?" He remarked as they headed toward a grocery store.

Jennifer shook her head. "Actually, no. I've only been up here once without them." She said.

"We should look in trying to change that a little." April noted. "It wouldn't hurt."

Jennifer laughed softly. "I don't know if you two should talk much." She remarked as she looked at Casey. "The only time you haven't been around the turtles was that hockey game and when you go home." She then looked to April. "And you don't even have anything other than going home on your shoulders. And of course when we were doing July 4th prep."

April laughed a bit. "I guess she has us there." She conceded.

"Sure." Casey shrugged good naturedly but then added, "But we're not the ones dating one of the turtles either." That got a small blush from Jennifer, and though he didn't notice it a small blush from April as well.

The three humans walked in and Casey gestured toward the other side of the store. "Mikey wanted me to make sure I got some specific candy, I'll meet you girls at the frozen pizza section." The currently non masked vigilante said.

"Sure thing." April agreed as Jennifer got a shopping cart. She looked to the blonde. "Did the guys give you money for this?" She asked.

Jennifer nodded. "A little, from what Master Splinter was able to dredge up. Donnie was suggesting they take some and start investing it somewhere." She answered. "But I'll end up paying for most of it."

April blinked in confusion and asked one simple word. "How?"

"I told you about mom." Jennifer said, and April nodded. "She knew for years it was coming and she…she probably knew at some point I would leave my father though she probably couldn't have foreseen the exact reasons. She spent those years setting up funds for me to draw from, which in the end seemed to be very fortuitous."

"How long will that last?" April asked as she stopped for some fresh vegetables. Jennifer planned on making some stir fry for Splinter that night while she and Mikey made pizza for everyone else, though April thought she might take some of the stir fry as well.

Jennifer shrugged. "At least a few years last I heard. It was completely isolated from my father's funds so he can't touch it. He probably doesn't even know about it." She replied. "After things have calmed down around here as far as this gang war that we all believe is coming up I should look into finding some kind of employment, though with nothing other than a high school degree I'm not really sure what I could do."

"Maybe nursing." April joked with a smile. She was subtly referring to the blonde's emerging healing abilities.

"I don't think it quite works that way." Jennifer said. "They still want that piece of paper, plus I don't have the control over it yet to be reliable."

"Plus as far as we can tell that won't help someone who's got a problem other than broken bones and cuts." April said and then shrugged. "Though you seem to have also healed whatever head trauma Raph took from Hector's attack."

Jennifer had to repress her feelings of regret over that. On one level she knew it wasn't really her fault but on another level she totally blamed herself for it all. "Still not sure how that happened though." She reminded. "Again, lack of control."

"Speaking of lack of control," April teased with another smile, "How are things with Raphael?"

The blonde's smile brightened. "Pretty well. It's nice to be close to someone who cares about me." She answered. "Raph wants to find a way to have us go on a real date but hasn't found one yet. I've tried to tell him it's okay as I know we can't have what one would call a conventional relationship but he keeps insisting on it."

"Have you ever had a boyfriend before?" April asked.

Jennifer shook her head. "Not really. By the time I entered high school my father was building his syndicate. He already had Gregory and Hector under his employ, and we all know how he looks at me." She shuddered just a little. "Those factors made having a boyfriend…difficult to say the least."

"Say no more." April said as she gently patted the blonde's hand.

"How about you?" Jennifer asked. "Any boyfriends? I mean you've known Donnie for a few years now."

"Donnie." April echoed, feeling the slightest of blushes.

"It's obvious he likes you." Jennifer answered. "And I've seen how you are around him sometimes, like the blushes that color your cheeks when he's mentioned lately."

April looked away. "It's complicated. Donnie is nice, he's smart, he's thoughtful and intelligent. He's sweet." She shook her head a bit as if to clear her thoughts which caused the blonde to giggle a little. "But Casey is great too. He may not look it but he's thoughtful and observant. Intelligent in his own way. He can be sweet too. He was half the reason I was able to work things out with the turtles after the mutation incident with my dad."

"Donnie was the other reason though, wasn't he?" Jennifer questioned.

April nodded. "Yes." She conceded. "I guess I'm stuck because I kind of like both of them. I don't want to let any of them down and I guess…I figure the best way to avoid that is to just keep all of us as friends."

"There might come a point where that won't work." Jennifer reminded her friend softly.

April nodded. "I know." She replied. "And I haven't figured out what to do if that time happens. I'm finding that making this choice is really hard. I think about the future and the problem I see is what you've already come to accept about a relationship with Raph, that it can't be at all conventional. But Casey doesn't think about the future at all as far as I can tell."

"When the time is right I think you'll figure it out." Jennifer said. "Just like I finally did. I just hope it doesn't take one of those guys getting gravely injured like Raph did before you figure it out." The blonde glanced around a bit. "Speaking of one of those guys, shouldn't Casey be back by now?"

"Good point." April noted. Both girls glanced around, neither seeing the shadow rising up from above them until they turned too late to do anything. Both looked ready to scream but nothing came from their mouths.

A few more hours passed, it getting toward noon. Mikey wasn't sure which brother was getting more worried; Donnie or Raph. At least Raph had a reason to be worried since Jennifer was his girlfriend while Donnie didn't have that reason.

Even Leo however was getting worried. "They should have been back by now, right?" He inquired of no one. None of the turtles had ever grocery shopped so they didn't really know how long it would normally take, especially for essentially eight people since Casey and April were often there with Splinter, the four turtles and Jennifer.

"I'm going to try April's T-phone." Donnie announced as he pulled out his own T-phone to make the call to the red head.

Raph paced over the punching bag and gave it a couple of good punches. He wasn't really sure what to say as expressing worry wasn't something he did often. Knowing how to express worry about a girlfriend was alien to him, something the red masked turtle had never expected to deal with.

Leo wandered over to the table for the remote control. "Maybe there was something going on that made them late. Maybe the news will tell us." He ventured.

"Then do it already." Raph snapped in between a couple more punches and an added kick to the punching bag.

Leo let his brother's temper flare slide as he was sure it was worry about Jennifer. Excluding a few missions and Hector's recent kidnapping the blonde had never really been completely out of their range since meeting her.

"April's not answering." Donnie said. "She always answers if she could."

"Maybe we should try one of their T-phones." Mikey suggested.

"I don't know if that would really help if April isn't responding Mikey." Raph stated even though he stopped to reach for his T-phone now.

"Hold up." Leo announced as he landed on a news station where again Carlos Chang O'Brien Gambe was reporting that over two dozen people had disappeared from stores in the last eight hours. He was in fact in front of the grocery store that Donnie remembered their human companions were supposed to go to.

"That can't be good." Raph said as he recognized it too.

"They're not answering their T-phones but are they still active?" Leo asked their brainy team mate.

"Hang on." Donnie said and wandered into the lab. He did come back a minute later and answered, "Yes, all three T-phones are still active, so to answer your next question we can trace the signal to find their location."

"Then let's do it." Raph said.

"Right." Leo agreed. "But it is daylight up there so we have to be careful and stay out of view."

"Yeah, yeah." Mikey said with a wave of his hand. "We're ninja, we got this." He looked to Donnie. "And we don't have to worry about April calling Donnie to blow our cover like in the Kraang water base."

"That would be a good thing in this case shell brain." Donnie reminded his youngest brother.

"Let's move." Leo said. All the turtles jumped past the turnstile and got onto street level. They had only gotten a few blocks though when Leo saw someone familiar. "Hold up guys." The blue masked turtle said.

"What now?" Raph asked impatiently. Leo pointed to a few rooftops over where they saw another turtle out. They assumed it was Aaliyah as she was the only turtle of their size, Slash being bigger than all of them.

"She's not doing anything wrong that we can see Leo." Donnie commented, almost as impatient as his red masked brother. "Just let her be and let's get going."

"Maybe she would know something." Leo said sternly to his two impatient brothers. "Fulcanelli could be responsible for this and she could be keeping it safe." He looked to Aaliyah and remembered their encounters with her, deciding that she was protecting it hard to believe. "Or might be trying to stop it."

"Fine." Raph said. "Let's catch up to her and find her." He looked to Leo. "But if she knows something and she's responsible for this I won't be held accountable for my actions."

"Technically you still could be." Mikey reminded him but stepped back a little as Raph gave him a cold glare.

The turtles easily caught up to Aaliyah, jumping out and surrounding her. To her credit she didn't draw her bunrei's and so the other turtles extended the same courtesy except of course for Raphael, who did draw his sais. "Out for a stroll?" The red masked turtle demanded.

"No." The white masked female answered, almost matching Raph's brusqueness. "I'm out looking for something."

"Like some pizza?" Mikey asked her. "Because we can help with that."

Aaliyah giggled for just a moment before cutting herself off. "No, no that." She said.

"What are you looking for then?" Leo asked sternly. He wanted to give the turtle girl the benefit of the doubt but his experiences with Karai reminded him that it could be in vain.

Aaliyah hesitated for a moment before answering. "I'm looking for a snake."

That wasn't the answer any of the ninja turtles expected. "Come again?" Donnie questioned.

"I'm looking for a snake, a cobra to be precise." Aaliyah repeated. She still didn't seem to cornered to be surrounded by the turtles. "Early this morning some experiment of Gregory's escaped the lab and despite Fulcanelli saying to leave it alone I'm trying to find it and figure out what to do about it."

"What do you mean by experiment?" Donnie asked her now.

"I don't know exactly." Aaliyah told him as she looked at the four turtles. "You have to remember that Candy and I are very reluctant soldiers. They're aren't prone to telling us there most secret plans." She looked again to Donnie. "But I do remember something also being mentioned about hypnotism."

"Isn't that an ice cream flavor?" Mikey asked. Raph sighed and slapped him upside the head.

"No, shell brain." Donnie said. "It's supposed to be a form of mind control that could be used to lead to suggestion on anything from behavior to even actions, or inaction I suppose." He looked to Aaliyah. "But I thought that was just stories."

"Like psychic powers?" Raph questioned him. Both April and Jennifer displayed the exact same power.

"I thought it was too." Aaliyah told the purple masked turtle.

"Is this experiment of his related to the disappearances?" Leo asked her.

"What disappearances?" The white masked turtle girl questioned.

"Those news trucks down there have reported dozens of disappearances while you've been skipping up here on the roof tops." Raphael told her.

"Could that cobra thing be responsible for it?" Mikey wondered.

"On its own, I doubt it." Donnie said but then glanced at Aaliyah. "But if it can hypnotize people then it could be responsible for it though I don't know why."

"I would guess a steady food source." Aaliyah said.

Donnie and Raph exchanged looks, both concerned for the girls they cared so much about. "We've got to follow the signals." The purple masked turtle said.

"What signals?" Aaliyah asked, afraid she had missed something in pursuit of the escaped experiment.

"We think three of the missing people are our human friends." Leo answered for her. "Including your 'bosses' daughter. We're following the tracking signals on their T-phones."

"Like a cell phone." Aaliyah reasoned.

"Yep. Except I call it the T-phone." Mikey said.

"I named it actually." Donnie said.

"Yeah, but I would have named it the T-phone anyway." Mikey whined.

"Can it dorks, let's move out." Raph said to his two younger brothers. Then he looked to Aaliyah. "Keep up if you can." He told the female turtle.

Aaliyah gave him a wide smile. "Just watch me." She said.

The now five turtles started roof jumping again, following Donnie's lead. Leo wondered if he should bring up the bracelet but was sure she would never go for it unless Candy was with her. "Where is your partner in crime anyway?" Raph asked her.

"Candy stayed back at the hide out we have to try to cover up the fact I'm pursing this despite Fulcanelli's command." Aaliyah answered.

"Why didn't Jennifer's dad want you to stop his away experiment in the first place?" Mikey asked her. Donnie thought that was a great question even though he suspected Mikey meant awry, not away.

"He wanted to see the chaos the thing would cause." Aaliyah replied, not even bothering to hide the disgust in her voice as it simply reflected the disgust she personally felt. "I knew that despite the fact she can fake it well enough, Candy is not fighter so I decided to deal with this solo."

"You're not dealing with it solo anymore." Raph found himself saying. He had to admit if she weren't the enemy he might actually find himself liking her.

They soon found themselves at a sewage plant. Most of the property was actually outdoors except for a few smaller buildings. Donnie quickly determined that the signals were outside on the far side of the property. They found a pile of bones and Mikey was tempted to freak out while Aaliyah was afraid she was going to be sick until Donnie confirmed the bones belonged to a deer, though even that was small consolation. Following the signals lead them to hypnotized humans of all kinds, including their friends.

"Where's the cobra thing then?" Mikey asked as he drew his nunchuks.

This time Aaliyah and his older brothers followed, drawing out their weapons. Raphael approached Casey and Jennifer and waved one of his hands in front of their faces only to get no response from his best friend and his girlfriend. "I don't like this." He said.

Leo turned at a slithering sound but found no one there. "I think that experiment is still here, he's toying with us." The blue masked turtle announced.

"I sssuposse I ssshouldn't be sssurprisssed that there are other creaturesss like me." They heard from behind them now. They turned to see a large grey scaled cobra mutant looking over at them. Though he had hands now he did not have feet, though it seemed like he had a huge tail to make up for it. He wore a vest that was the same material as a pair of blue jeans and wore sunglasses.

"Nice get up." Mikey remarked. "Cool Cobra."

"Cool Cobra?" Aaliyah questioned.

"He's trying to name the mutant." Raph explained to the female turtle with a roll of his eyes.

Aaliyah looked to Mikey. "I think you need to try again." She commented.

Leo ignored the banter of his two brothers and their temporary ally though he had to admit it disturbed him a bit to hear this mutant talking like Karai talked when she was in her mutant form. "Let these people out of whatever trance you have them under and then set them free." He demanded. "Or face the Turtles of Justice."

"Turtles of Justice?" Aaliyah asked with a snicker.

"Dorky, right." Raph said.

"Thessse humansss will keep me in food for monthsss." The snake mutant said. "I don't know if I can eat you turtlesss but perhapsss you five could ssserve as my bodyguardsss."

"Fat chance pal." Donnie replied.

The snake mutant lowered the sunglasses and to the surprise of the five turtles his eyes had a hypnotic swirl to them. It reminded the four brothers of the hypnotic coin that the orange masked turtle had once found in the sewers and was now stashed somewhere in his room.

"Look into my eyesss turtlesss." The cobra said. "Look deep into them, and then look deep into your ssselvesss. Lossse yourssself in the gaze."

Raph's anger quickly asserted itself and he responded with, "No chance Snake Eyes." He leapt up and kicked the cobra monster in the chest. He stumbled back hard and that broke the grip he had on the other turtles.

"Mental note." Donnie said. "Do not look into his eyes."

"Yeah, Snake Eyes tried to hypnotize you." Raph told his brothers and Aaliyah. "Luckily right now my anger pretty much came in handy."

"Don't let that go to your head." Leo said to his oldest brother.

"Snake Eyes, huh?" Aaliyah said. "Not bad actually."

"Fine." Mikey said with a roll of his eyes. "We'll go with your name this time, bro." He looked to Raph. "But I get to name the next one." The red masked turtle just rolled his eyes at that.

"I think we'd better focus on Snake Eyes." Donnie interjected.

"If you won't ssserve me then I'll have your ssshellsss for trophiesss." Snake Eyes stated and then whirled around and slammed his tail right into the five mutant turtles. They sprawled hard but recovered quickly.

"Donnie, we need a plan." Leo said. "How do we free the people so we can stop Snake Eyes?"

"I don't quite know." Donnie admitted but then put forth a hypothesis. "He's probably concentrating really hard to keep them hypnotized. If we find a way to break that concentration it should free them all."

"That's great." Mikey said and cocked his head. "But how do we do that?" All five turtles dodged out of the way of another huge tail slap.

"I think I have an idea for that one." Aaliyah said. "Can you keep this guy distracted for a minute or two?"

"Remind we why we should trust you." Raph commented.

"Because if she's right we can free the people, including our friends and Jennifer." Leo reminded his brother sternly and then looked to Aaliyah. "We'll make it so, do what you need to." The female turtle nodded and then ran off.

"Okay, fearless leader." Raph said. "What do we do then while we're hoping that girl doesn't stab us in the back for your naivety?"

"Jump and lead him away. If Aaliyah's plan works we don't need a bunch of people knowing we exist." Leo commanded simply as Snake Eyes tried to tail slap them again. They ran to the side of the building and Snake Eyes followed them, intent on ending their threat.

Donnie used that tail as leverage to deliver a kick to Snake Eyes and then Mikey followed by slapping his upside the head with his nunchuk. Unfortunately for them it didn't seem to do more than briefly faze them.

"Let's see if we can bind him." Donnie suggested.

"On it." Mikey replied, changing his nunchuck into the Kusarigama chain and then wrapped the cobra creature in the chains, his tail pinned against the back of his body.

"I think it worked." Raph said.

That was when Snake Eyes reared his head and spit poison at the chain. It sizzled for a moment before snapping.

"Or not." Raph said lamely.

"Enough with thisss." Snake Eyes roared and then lowered his eyes to glare his hypnotic gaze at Leo. "I will have you dessstroy your companionsss for me." He began his hypnotic glare

"Not so fast." Aaliyah interrupted as she landed in front of the boys with a mid-size bathroom mirror in her hand. She aimed it directly at Snake Eyes and he found himself lost in his own hypnosis.

That caused the hold he had over the people to vanish, and they stood around confused before starting to disburse. April however sensed the turtles and quickly stopped Jennifer and Casey from drifting off. They instead headed toward the turtles.

"What do we do with him now?" Mikey asked.

"Surely we don't hand Snake Eyes over to her to take back to Fulcanelli." Raph added.

"I don't want to take him back to Fulcanelli." Aaliyah stated. "This thing is too dangerous to be allowed under his 'command'. I don't even want Candy and I to be under his 'command.'" The rest of the team could hear the frustration and sadness in her voice. "But…can we really kill Snake Eyes?"

"What choice do we have?" Raph asked.

He then felt a hand on his arm and he turned to see Jennifer. They embraced for a moment and then she pulled back just enough to view the situation. "We can't just kill him. It's not his fault he ended up this way anymore than it's anyone else's fault for their mutation." She said.

Raph sighed but relented. "Yeah, I guess you're right."

"What are we supposed to do then?" Casey asked. "Set up a king sized terrarium?" He then realized Aaliyah was there as well. "When did the evil turtle girl join the club?"

"It's only temporary Jones." Donnie half assured him. In truth he found he wouldn't mind if it were more permanent.

One moment Aaliyah was holding the mirror to keep Snake Eyes hypnotized, and the next out of nowhere it just shattered though they all thought they heard some sort of evil laughter as it did so. Snake Eyes looked at them sharp eyed but realized he was basically outnumbered. He turned and quickly dove into the drainage system.

"Damn it." Raph cursed. "One more rogue mutant to add to the list."

"It doesn't matter right now." Leo said as he looked to their three human friends. "Everyone alright?"

"We're good dude." Casey replied.

"Thanks to you guys." April added with a smile, finding herself saving Donnie for last.

"Thank you for your help." Leo said to Aaliyah. "I only wish we could help both you and Candy."

"There might still be a way." The female turtle said to him. "I have to go though so that way hopefully Candy won't be in any trouble, or at least any more than she might already be."

"You don't have to stay with my father." Jennifer reminded her.

She looked to the blonde. "You of all people know that we don't really have that choice right now." Aaliyah then dropped a smoke bomb and vanished.

"You know, I kind of wish she had stayed around." Mikey admitted.

"Me too." Leo agreed. "She's really good."

"Yeah, even I think that." Raph said. "But as Master Splinter said about Karai, that's their decision."

"So, uh, now that that's settled, can we go back so they can get the groceries?" Mikey asked. "I'm hungry." This elicited sighs from the rest of the group but they started to leave to get the groceries none the less.

How will the turtles help Aaliyah and Candy? Will Snake Eyes play a role in the coming gang war? What's next for our heroes? More to come, and please remember to review, always looking for ideas as well.


	18. Revenge Sought

Disclaimer: Don't own TMNT, if you see it in the series then it isn't mine.

Mikey: Don't you get tired of this? I do.

Donnie: Hey, it's mandatory.

Over the last few days the news started to report increasing activity among many of the gangs in New York. Many weren't too concerned about the Purple Dragons and most could not identify the Foot Clan, though Splinter had believed that Shredder and his minions hadn't been involved in most of the attacks, likewise Jennifer believed her father had not been involved in most of them either which was supported by the lack of demon presence noted at any of the attacks. Most of the damage right now seemed to be being caused by Chein Khan and his army of ninja's that he called the Goldens and by his brother Yen and his Dark Oni.

April and Casey ran from out of the door of their high school. "We have to hurry." April said to him.

"I'm coming." Casey told her. "Though I don't really know what the big deal is."

"I want to know what Jennifer is going to choose for her weapon." April responded. They both quickly turned a right corner and continued to run. "I don't know how long they'll wait for us; I'm surprised they even agreed to try to wait for us."

They got ready to turn another corner when from out of nowhere one of Chein Khan's white ninjas appeared in front of them, reaching out and snagging April's arm. Casey moved to react before realizing he had left his equipment sack in the lair since he knew they were going there after classes. He was unarmed. He still tried to swing at the white ninja but it easily evaded and on top of it was able to easily ignore April's attempt to break free.

"Let us go." April demanded of the white ninja who never really talked anyway.

"I'm afraid that isn't possible my dear." Said Chein Khan as he stepped out from the shadows. "I require your assistance for a most important task in my quest to take over this city."

"Maybe you haven't noticed, dog boy." Casey snapped at him. "But we're not into helping the bad guys."

Chein Khan gave a dismissive wave. "We don't need you boy. You're really just in the way. But we can't allow you to run to the turtles." He said. He looked to the red head. "You on the other hand will help us rather you want to or not." With that the White ninja placed his hands on her head and white energy seeped into her as she let out a scream.

From the sidelines Casey Jones could do nothing, except to reach into his pocket and press an emergency button on his own T-phone.

"Dude, I hope Casey and April get here soon." Mikey commented as he took a slice from pizza from his plate. He was watching Crognard the Barbarian but right now it was playing a commercial. "I want to see what kind of options Master Splinter gives Jennifer for her weapons."

On the couch Raphael sat there with his own pizza. Jennifer sat next to him, her head on his arm as she read the Slayers book. "Chill out Mikey." Raph said to his youngest brother. "We've got time."

Jennifer looked up from her book. "In all honesty I'm not entirely sure that I'm ready for that step." She confessed.

Leo was playing with the Space Heroes pinball machine, trying to beat the latest high score that as set by the red masked turtle. He stopped to look over at Jennifer. "Don't worry Jennifer; you're as ready as anyone can be." The blue masked turtle assured the blonde. "Especially under the circumstances."

"Somehow I don't think that'll make her feel any better." Raph stated to his oldest brother with a glare.

"No, it's fine." Jennifer said to her red masked boyfriend. Truth be told she still sometimes found it hard to believe she could call Raph her boyfriend. "It makes me feel a little better. And I already know the upcoming gang war is a large part of the reason that I'm even getting this kind of push so soon."

"Ooh, its back on." Mikey said as he turned back to the TV and ignored all the conversation.

As Donnie was coming out of his lab they heard beeping from their T-phones. All four turtles and Jennifer pulled out their T-phones. "What does this mean?" She asked, having never seen this one before.

"It's a distress signal." Leo stated as he looked to his brothers. "From Casey's phone. He and April must have run into some kind of trouble."

"We can track them though as long as they still have their T-phones." Donnie said as he looked down to his T-phone to activate the tracking app. "As long as they still have them of course."

"What are we waiting for then?" Raph demanded. "Let's go after them."

"I'm ready." Jennifer said.

"I need you to stay here this time." Leo told the blonde. "We know nothing about what's going on. Besides I don't think it's wise to leave Master Splinter alone here either. No one should be alone right now if we can avoid it."

"Maybe Master Splinter can squeeze a training session in for you while we're gone." Donnie suggested to her.

Their rat master and father had heard the commotion and had come out of the dojo. "My sons, go and make sure April and Casey are alright." He instructed. He looked to Jennifer. "Donatello is right, this is a good time to work in another training session if you are ready."

Jennifer nodded. She could understand where Leo was coming from and more important she needed to be ready for when the war did truly start. "Hai, Sensei. I'm ready." She confirmed.

Raphael leaned down and brushed Jennifer's lips with his own. "We'll be back with April and Casey." He promised her.

"Good luck." Jennifer called out to the turtles as they jumped over the turnstile with Raph pausing long enough to grab Casey's equipment bag. She then turned to follow Master Splinter into the dojo."

Casey at first thought it was a stroke of good luck that Chein Khan and his two white ninja lead them into the sewers, even more so that one of the white ninja had to hold April, who had lost consciousness during whatever it had done to her. That soon changed when they were joined by so many Golden ninjas and even more white ninjas. These numbers would even be hard for both the turtles and Mutanimals to overcome.

"I know what you're thinking." Chein Khan said as he glanced at the vigilante. "These numbers would undoubtfully overwhelm those reptilian mutants you hang out with, along with any other allies you might have." He laughed a bit as if the idea of using these forces to overwhelm the turtles was an appealing thought. "But fear not, boy. This isn't for your friends. These forces are going to be my brother's undoing."

"You don't even know where you brother is." Casey gloated. It was kind of a pointless one since the truth was that neither did any of them.

"Not true." Chein Khan responded. "Recently one of my men found the general location where my brother is staying at. The White Ninja has duplicated O'Neil's power so that we may find the exact location. That is where we are going where my army, combined with your friend's power, will allow me to finally destroy my brother." He then looked to Casey with an evil smile. "And then you two will be the first sacrifice on my altar to my master."

It soon became apparent as they seemed to leave the sewers and enter a tunnel that seemed more like a rocky cave of some kind than the sewer tunnels they were all used too. Casey was sure the turtles had no idea this even existed and had his doubts that Splinter knew about it either.

The first indication that they were indeed onto something was when he saw two Dark Oni, but these were different from the ones that Yen has used to test them at the lair or to help them when Chein Khan first showed himself in New York. These two had claw like appendages instead of hands, like they were crabs of some sort.

Two Golden's tried to rush them but their pincers destroyed the spears they wielded. Two other white ninja jumped over the two black clad ninjas and brought their swords down on them, splitting them nearly in half before dissolving away.

"Prepare yourselves." Chein Khan stated to his men. "We draw near. Remember the Dark Oni are fair game, but Yen is mine to destroy."

The weapons of the Golden's started to glow as if someone had used the slow smoke bomb but no one had. Then Casey remembered the discovery that was made about how they could use those enchantments on their weapons to defeat the Dark Oni. He wasn't quite sure who to root for here; on one hand none of them were sure how far to trust Yen. On the other hand, they all knew they couldn't trust Chein Khan.

They had only continued on for a little bit when they saw Yen standing on the other side with more Dark Oni. "Well, brother." Yen said. "I was wondering when you would get here."

"I'm going to finally put you out of my misery Yen." Chein Khan spat. "Get them my Goldens." All of them started forward except for the white ninja holding April and two Golden's who had Casey.

"Eliminate them." Yen ordered his Dark Oni. If he recognized or was even concerned about April and Casey's presence with his brother and army he didn't show it.

Casey honestly couldn't tell who was winning this fight. It seemed as the Dark Oni were more skilled because of being demons of some sort but the weapons that were used by the Golden's allowed them to dissipate their adversaries in one hit. The vigilante figured that it would depend largely on which brother prevailed.

In terms of skill, Yen seemed to clearly be better than Chein Khan. Casey suspected that he had an ace up his sleeve that he had yet to reveal

Yen disarmed his brother of his weapon and kicked the bull dog mutants shin to drive him to one knee, then pointed his own sword down at him. "You were always inferior to be Khan." The man gloated. "Any last words cur?"

"Yes." Chein Khan stated. "You were always too dependent on black magic." He reached behind his back and Casey noticed that he had smoke bomb like object in his hand which he then hurled toward his older brother. "That is thing I decided to take from your playbook."

At first Casey wasn't sure what it did but then before his eyes Yen started to rapidly age. Chein Khan used the distraction to kick him hard and catch his older brother's sword. The kick itself sent Yen sprawling and the vigilante even swore he heard some ribs breaking. "Destroy them." He commanded his Oni and then used the resurgence to go as quickly as possible down the tunnel.

Chein Khan laughed as he recovered his own sword. "Victory is at hand my Goldens." He stated. "We have weakened my brother, and that has in turn weakened the Dark Oni." It did indeed seem to be a true statement as the Golden's were repelling them much easier than they had even a moment before. "It's time to end this and appease my master."

Yen had to grant his little brother one thing. He did seem to be right that he had been too dependent on dark magic for his own wars and even his own longevity. Not that demon sponsors were much better as at least black magic collected it's 'costs' much later in life, and if one avoids the end they avoid that cost. Demons weren't nearly as patient.

He entered the main chamber and looked around. He had several powerful trinkets lying around. One was a six sided gold looking medallion that he acquired in 19th century Japan that allowed his control over the Dark Oni. In the center was a kiddie pool sized round object that was black right now but he had used it multiple times to locate things, like the turtle's lair. The shaman he acquired it from had called it a seer's eye. He never figured out what powered it but it had the faint smell of gasoline.

The object before it though was what interested him. It was a small golden goblet with purple jewels around the rim of the cup. In it was what had kept him young for centuries, some sort of elixir that was rumored to have come from the fabled fountain of youth. Yen had had scouts in Florida looking for it but no one had ever found it. He started to walk toward it but he fell to the ground and then started to crawl for it.

He was just about to reach for it when Chein Khan appeared in front of him and grabbed the goblet. "I think not, 'brother'." Chein Khan mocked.

"Give that to me." Yen croaked out. "You don't know what that is."

"But I do." Chein Khan responded. "This is the dark magic that has kept you alive for so long while I have relied on my master Noi Tai Dar for that." He lifted it up higher. "And now with this I will no longer have to rely on that, and I should even be able to allow my master to live forever with this."

"Casey, what's going on?" April asked as she was regaining consciousness. "Who is that? Where are we?"

"Yen's base." Casey answered her quietly. "That old man is Yen, Chein Khan did something to him to age him and supposedly that goblet is what kept Yen alive for so long. I don't know about anything else here."

"This is not good." April said. "And I don't think we can break out of these guys' grips to help him."

It was about to become a moot point as Chein Khan walked around his rapidly aging and ailing brother. "This is over. I have won. You have lost. And soon so shall the rest of this world." He stated and then kicked Yen hard in the side.

To April and Casey's horror he went flying into the round kiddie pool like object and with what amounted to the sound of a mosquito flying into a bug zapper and a screech of pain Yen evaporated into nothing.

"That's that." Chein Khan stated simply as if he hadn't just killed his own brother. He then turned to look at the two humans. "Ah, you're awake girl." He laughed. "You two are next, sacrifices for my dark lord. But you did me a favor, no matter how unintentional, and I am a generous man. I will grant you each one last request."

"Bite me dog boy." Casey snapped.

"Go to hell." April glared at him.

"I'm afraid not, boy." Chein Khan sighed. "As for you girl, why should I do that when I can bring my own version of hell here." He looked to the one's holding the two humans hostage. "Prepare to toss them in."

"Booyakasha!" Mikey exclaimed as he leapt past some Golden's and kicked two white ninja in the back.

Donnie used his Naginata to stab the white ninja in the back and then caught April with, "I've got you April."

April smiled at Donnie. "You always do." She said softly.

Raph kicked the two Golden's holding Casey in the head and they fell to the ground with a heavy thump. "Brought a present for you dude." The red masked turtle stated as he tossed him his equipment bag.

"Awesome." Casey laughed as he put it on his back.

"Party's over Chein Khan." Leo told the pit bull mutant as he landed in front of his brother's and friends. Donnie released April and the red head drew her tessen's. Casey drew a hockey stick and they all stood with the leader of the team.

Chein Kahn laughed. "So you showed, turtles." He remarked. "But now I will win this fight too, and then only the Foot clan and Fulcanelli will stand in my way. For a short time." He waved the hand not holding the goblet. "Goldens, end these miserable reptiles once and for all."

The Golden's surged forward but the black clad ninjas were easily dispatched as they tried to approach. The white ninja were more of challenge but Leo and Raph were able to take them out with little difficulty now that they knew their weakness and that they were in a more confined area.

"No way is this going down." Casey said. He dropped a puck with a cherry bomb lodged in it. "Goongala!" He exclaimed as he slapped it with the hockey stick. It shot out rapidly, striking Chein Khan's hand that held the goblet. He lost his hold on it and it fell to the ground, shattering and spilling the liquid inside of it. That wasn't all though as the puck rebounded off and landed into the hole that Yen had seemed to meet his end at.

There was a loud explosion and many of the Golden's went flying into the wall. Ricochets followed shattering many of the objects in the room as well. "What did you do?" Donnie asked the vigilante.

"Making sure that Chein Khan doesn't get a thing from his brother's stash." He told the turtles. "He killed Yen before you guys showed up."

"Drag." Mikey commented.

"That was noble of you Jones." Raph said sarcastically. "But now the place is pretty much going off on us, it's time to get the shell out of here." No one disagreed and since Chein Khan seemed to be distracted and there were no Golden's around the six heroes made their way out of the lair and toward the main sewers.

Chein Khan saw them leave but could do nothing about it. "I will make you pay, this battle is done and I still won. But the war is coming, and I will win that as well." He vowed.

"Your progress is astounding." Splinter noted as he watched Jennifer finish a moderately difficult kata that she had only been practicing for a few days. In fairness a lot of it involved a good amount of flexibility which the rat master had seen her gymnastics' training had gone a long way to preparing her for.

Jennifer finished and took a bow. "Thank you master." She said.

Splinter came forward and gently touched her shoulder. "I am grateful for your presence my dear." He admitted. "You have been a great help to us in your short time here, especially for my son Raphael."

"I'm happy to do what I can." She answered with a smile.

"Raphael has always had a strong and short temper. In many ways he still does and I expect always will." Splinter explained the young blonde. "But in some ways I have seen it dulled down, and I have no doubt that that is because of your love and your influence on him."

Jennifer went over to the tree and picked up the bottle water sitting there. "I just hope that they're alright and that they bring April and Casey back okay." She said before taking a drink. After swallowing she added, "It's been almost an hour already."

"There are times they are gone for much longer." Splinter reminded her. "You will realize that as you start helping them with missions, which for better or worse may be sooner than I would prefer in ideal circumstances."

Jennifer nodded softly. "I did promise to help April with rescuing your daughter." She agreed.

"When you two are ready and not before." Splinter reminded the blonde girl sternly.

Jennifer bowed slightly. "Hai, Sensei." She agreed.

They heard the turtles coming into the lair through the turnstiles and Jennifer was delighted to see they had April and Casey with them. She ran forward to give April a hug and said, "I am so glad you're okay."

April was a bit startled as she had never had a female friend outside of Irma who had really been Kraang subprime in disguise but hugged the blonde back gently. "Barely." She admitted. "I'll tell you about it later."

Jennifer nodded and then turned to hug Raphael as well, planting a kiss on his lips gently. When she pulled back she said, "I'm glad you're okay. I was worried."

"It's okay, babe." Raph replied. "I'm fine, but I'm glad I've got your prayers to help keep me safe."

They all sat down on the dojo mat and Casey and Leo took turns telling Splinter what had happened in the last almost two hours. After hearing the grim results of the incident the rat master sighed softly. "It is a shame. Yen seemed honorable enough and aside from the Mutanimals he was the closest we may have had as an ally in what is to come." He noted.

"It sounds like the war may be picking up heat soon Sensei." Donnie noted.

"And with that." Splinter rose and gestured a table behind the tree where several weapons were set on it. "Jennifer, you have proven yourself ready for this. You may choose whichever weapon you wish. Just remember that your weapon must choose you as much as you choose it."

April nodded. "That's right. It has to feel right in your hands, it has to move with the same fluidity that you would move your arms." She said, sounding somewhat dramatic though it seemed as if Master Splinter approved of her words.

Jennifer found one weapon that she could not even lift, counting that one out. She tried the same chained weapon that April had tried but it went flying and almost hit Casey in the head, which drew laughter from everyone except himself and Splinter. Finally she found two batons, like what police officers often carried. Holding the base of the batons she twirled them around a little before settling them against her arms. She then rotated them quickly so that she held the ends and practiced a few jabs and strikes with them.

"Those seem to suit you." Leo noted. "Small but powerful."

"And, with Master Splinter's permission, I can modify the handle for you with a switch that can extend blades out from the ends of those batons too." Donnie added.

"If that is what Jennifer wishes, I have no objections to that." Splinter told her.

Jennifer's hands went back to the handles of the weapons, twirled them again and made as if to sheath them. "I like these." Jennifer agreed with a smile. "And those blades sound like a good idea. We've already seen some enemies just don't care about blunt weapons."

"Then I'll get right to it." Donnie said as he took the two batons from Jennifer.

"We will start training with those tonight." Master Splinter told her. That was one advantage of training her compared to most of his training with April, she had no one waiting for her to come home and so she could be trained whenever they got that chance. "I believe you will only have a short time to train with them before the real battle begins."

Yen's hideout was a wreck, smoke was everywhere though there was nothing around to be breathing it. At least nothing that would care. From the smoke though came another figure. Most of the trinkets were useless but the currently rhino looking creature didn't care. He reached down for the one salvageable item he could find, the medallion that controlled the Dark Oni. "Fulcanelli will be pleased with this newest addition to our demon army." Hector said to himself as he grinned cruelly.

The gang war has started. Is Yen really gone? Is Jennifer ready for what is to come? What exactly is to come anyway? Things start coming to a head.


	19. Meeting Renet

Disclaimer: Don't own TMNT, if it's on the show I don't own it.

Raph: You getting as tired of reading this as I am? Hope you're getting tired of putting that in.

Leo: It's standard procedure, so just deal with it.

This is not though, this takes place after 08/02's Turtles in Time and what will be 8/09's Tale of the Yokai but any events there will be kind of vagued up since it has not been shown yet but wanted to get Renet incorporated into here on some level.

Raphael sat on the couch with Jennifer by his side, both of them holding hands and talking. They could hear Donnie working in his lab again. Leo was in Master Splinter's room talking about what had transpired on their recent trip into time as they all waited for Casey and April to come to the lair so they could all meet their new friend.

"So do you think your trip to Japan helped Leo come to terms with his feelings about Karai?" Jennifer asked her boyfriend as she was rubbing the pad on his wrist.

She felt Raph shrug. "I don't know exactly." He admitted as he stroked her long blonde hair gently. "Maybe a little bit. Enough that maybe he can move on from her." Raph chuckled a bit. "Though he'll still want to help bring her here, for our family's sake if nothing else.

"That's okay." Jennifer remarked. "April and I are still determined to figure out how to break Karai free of that damn mind control worm that is controlling her."

"Man, it would have been nice to have you around at that point too." Raph noted. "Then maybe it wouldn't have been so hard to break free from it."

Jennifer seemed lost in thought a moment before she asked, "Do you really think me being around earlier would have changed a lot?"

Raph bit his lip a little as he thought about it. "I don't know." He admitted. "I mean Master Splinter would have had more time to train you and that would have been a plus. We might have been together longer instead of just starting out now, and that would also be a big plus."

"Assuming I lived through it all." Jennifer commented. "The Kraang's first invasion, the Kraang's second invasion when the lair was attacked. Karai could have killed me to get to April that time at Murikami's. There are any number of situations."

"Or maybe Karai would have never gone after April if she had to worry about someone helping her out." Raph countered. "I mean that was also before we knew Casey."

"Then maybe we wouldn't know Casey in that case." Jennifer noted. "If you had known me then Mr. O'Neil might have never been mutated, April would have never tried to distance herself from you and met Casey, and then unintentionally brought him in the fold upon her return."

"If that had happened though," Raph mused uneasily. "Then maybe you would have been mutated instead. Maybe we would have lost you, and if something happened and Donnie hadn't been able to make a retro mutagen than you…"

"No point in dawdling on that." Donnie said as he came out of the lab and headed toward the TV to try to install a DVD player on it that Jennifer had recently brought back from a shopping trip with April and Casey. "As Renet herself would probably point out time has any number of variables that could be accounted for in any number of scenarios, but what matters is the here and now."

Raph laughed. "I don't think she'd say so in so many words." The red masked turtle pointed out and then after a moment added, "I don't even think she could say that at all without it making sense to anyone but her."

"I think it's funny that Renet shows up just after Mikey teases Leo and Donnie about their feelings about Karai and April." Jennifer said with a small giggle. "Though I note he didn't tease you about us."

"That's because he's smarter than that." Raph said with a mock threatening tone he reserved just for his little brother.

"Plus Karai and April don't live with us." Donnie pointed out to the two of them. "You do live here Jennifer, and that means it would get back to you eventually. And Mikey does like you after all."

"There is that." Raph had to concede.

"So you don't like Renet then?" Jennifer asked Raph.

After a moment Raph shrugged. "I didn't say that. She seems nice enough I guess. It's just that she just fell into our lives and we barely know her."

"I just fell into your life and you're still learning about me." Jennifer pointed out softly.

"You came into our lives because we rescued you." Donnie pointed out. "Just like what happened with April. There is a difference there."

"When I say Renet fell into our lives I do mean that literally." Raph said with a small snicker. "Mikey ran over and caught her before she met the rooftop. I guess I think about Karai and how she showed up out of nowhere too but she was really working with Shredder and the Foot against us. It's a hard memory to let go."

"You're going to have to try if April and I succeed in getting that worm out of her mind." Jennifer lectured him gently. "After all where do you think Karai will be going if that happens?"

"I know, I know." Raph said.

At that point they heard laughter from the kitchen and out came Mikey and the apprentice time mistress herself Renet Tilley. In a small cooler in Mikey's left hand was Ice Cream Kitty while in his right hand was Renet's left hand as she held the time scepter in her right hand.

"That Ice Cream Kitty of yours is so cold." Renet stated perkily.

"Um, don't you mean cool?" Mikey asked.

"Well, sort of." Renet said. "I mean being ice cream she's also cold too." She giggled a little. "She cool cold…or cold cool…or something like that."

Mikey laughed. "Yeah, that makes sense."

"To those two anyway." Raph whispered to Jennifer which drew a smile from the blonde.

Renet and Mikey came to the couch and Mikey sat down as Renet looked around a little bit. "This place is so bawsome." She said.

"I think you mean awesome." Jennifer corrected her. She assumed a girl from the future probably didn't know the same lingo that teens used around here.

"Yeah, that." Renet agreed with a laugh. "Why would something a sheep would say make sense anyway?"

"Technically sheep only say baa." Donnie said.

"Not that we've ever heard any sheep in our lives." Raph pointed out. "Even April' farm didn't have sheep running around. Just chickens."

"How is Dr. Cluckinsgworth anyway?" Renet asked them.

"We haven't seen her since we left the farmhouse to take New York back from the Kraang invasion." Donnie reminded her.

Renet looked confused for a moment and then seemed to realize something. "Oh, yeah. That hasn't happened yet." She said.

"What hasn't happened yet?" Raph asked suspiciously.

Donnie beat his older brother to the punch before Renet could try to say it. "Raph, the less we know about the future, ours or otherwise, the safer it is." He lectured.

"Yeah, Raph." Mikey added. "Don't you remember that from like dozens of episodes of Space Heroes?"

"I don't think a show that stupid really counts for anything educational Mikey." Raph scolded his youngest brother.

"Actually Space Heroes is more realistic than it sounds." Renet intervened, sounding entirely knowing and intelligent. "There is so much of that stuff that is based off of reality, or what will be reality sometime. And you fi…four turtles could even be alive long enough for it to matter."

"Reality?" Raph questioned.

"I suppose one never knows Raph." Jennifer pointed out. She was sure Renet was about to say something about five turtles but had to assume that was a mistake. She already knew that there was no way that Jennifer would live as long as the turtles and likewise was sure Renet would never say that no matter what she may or may not know.

"I hope your other friends get here soon." Renet remarked as she looked around, now a little worried. "It's a miracle that Lord Simultaneous hasn't already come to find me since he's grounded me and all."

Renet needn't have worried as April and Casey came through the turnstiles but stopped few steps in after they saw Renet standing there in the living room with the turtles. Casey did a double take look at Renet and then whispered to himself, "Not bad." That response drew an elbow into his side from April.

"April." Donnie said happily and then his voice fell a little flatter. "And Casey, too."

"Hey guys." Mikey said as he stood up happily. "Meet our newest friend, time mistress Renet Tilley. We met her when she came here looking for help from the famous turtle warriors to stop this mutant called Savanti Romero."

"Hello." April started. "Nice to meet you, I'm…"

"April O'Neill and Casey Jones." Renet said perkily again. "I am so glad to meet you two too. But that's apprentice time mistress."

"You know about us?" Casey asked.

"Of course." Renet said with a giggle. "Everyone knows that the brave and powerful turtle warriors was composed of more than just the turtles." She looked to Jennifer now as if intuitively knowing the blonde might need a confidence booster as well. "Everyone associated with them eventually finds themselves in the position of becoming a strong and powerful warrior."

"What is that you're holding Renet?" April asked the mysterious time mistress.

"Huh?" Renet asked confused until she looked to her right hand and realized what April was asking about. What was second nature to her was of course new to them. "Oh, this is the time scepter. I use it to travel back in time. You'll see how it works later when we…"

"No talk about the future, remember?" Donnie prodded the time mistress.

Renet blushed just a bit. "Oh, yeah."

"So there's another mutant?" Casey asked. "Where did he go?"

"Well to be honest, we don't really know." Renet admitted. "I kind of…used the time scepter to send Savanti Romero through a time door but even I'm not entirely sure where he ended up at. Then we kind of got caught in a time interference and I lost the turtles briefly in feudal Japan, but I think that's a story for them to tell you about."

"That's actually where Leo is right now." Raph supplied. "He's talking with Splinter about it. Everyone knows that he's basically our family history guy."

"So as a time mistress…er, apprentice time mistress." Casey corrected himself as he spoke. "That means you know everything that is going to happen with us."

"Well, most of it." Renet amended a bit shyly. "I mean time flows pretty steadily but the truth is that sometimes things happen that can change things in ways other than what seems to be."

"So you being here could disrupt that?" April asked her, warming up to the subject.

"Well, possibly." Renet said, also warming up a bit to the subject she had spent a while studying for. "I mean again nothing is concrete, things can change like a…a drop of water in an otherwise stable pond and it causes effect ripples."

"My head hurts." Casey noted with a sigh.

"See, the thing is that not even a time lord like my master Lord Simultaneous can really know everything about something as unknown as time. We can only really get so much, and there's a chance we don't even understand what we see." Renet said.

"So that means we weren't supposed to meet today? Or were we?" Raph asked.

"Well…" Renet hesitated just a bit. "I don't really know. I mean when I came to you for help with Savanti Romero I knew about you of course but I didn't really know you, what you would think or entirely how you would act."

"I bet Raph's temper is well known though." Casey joked and the red masked turtle threw a soda can at him, which he dodged.

"Sure, some things are well known." Renet agreed. "But there is a difference well known facts that can be found in history books and pieces of small information that are lost in history. Like for example everyone knows when the Mighty Mutanimals formed and who was responsible, but no one really knows who Jack Kirby approached first or who might have refused a position in that team."

"Why would anyone do that?" Mikey asked her.

"Personal grudges, an unwillingness to be part of a team, worry over being part of something bigger, worry over something or someone more important." Renet listed off, her voice getting gentler as she went on.

Jennifer was starting to think that the apprentice time mistress knew more about all of it than she was saying. She hadn't said anything to Raph but she too had watched Space Heroes and remembered a lot of the shows, including all the anecdotes about time travel. Somehow though she suspected if it really became important the young girl would gladly break those beliefs over seeing them all gone, especially as she looked over at Mikey and the two exchanged a smile.

Splinter and Leo came out of into the living area. "Master Splinter, this is Renet, the apprentice time mistress I told you about." The blue masked turtle said.

Splinter approached her. "It is nice to meet you, Ms. Renet Tilley. Though it would have been nice if it had happened some other way than taking my sons through time." He said with a wry smile.

"It wasn't entirely planned that way, sir." Renet said as she gave a slight bow to the rat master.

"Many things seem to happen here that are not expected." Splinter said knowingly.

"Yeah." Renet agreed with a smile. She glanced around. "I better get back though, before Lord Simultaneous has a heart attack and then triples my grounding."

"Go in peace, and be well then." Splinter said.

"Bye, Renet." Mikey said as he got up. "Take care of yourself, and I hope to see you again." He paused just a moment and then added, "Real soon." This got small snickers out of his three brothers since it had seemed like not too long ago that he had been teasing his brothers about being in love.

"See you on the chip side." Renet said as she opened up a time door and started to step through it.

"That's flip side." Leo called out, unsure if the apprentice time mistress had heard her or not as the time door closed.

"Well, my sons." Splinter said as he looked around the living room. "Leonardo has already told me about his impressions based on your unexpected trip back in time to Japan, but I would ask that you contribute your impressions as well, and I am sure that April and Casey would like to hear about it as well."

Renet appeared right in front of her master, who gave her glower of slight annoyance. "So, before your grounding begins Renet, I would like to know what you learned from this." He stated.

Renet bit her lip as she thought a moment and went to hang the time scepter where it belonged. "It was actually really very cold...I mean cool." She admitted. "I went back a little too far in time but it still worked out. They're definitely what history says they are. Leo is the fearless leader, Raph is the warrior with the soft heart, Donnie is the intelligent strategist and Mikey is definitely the cute champion." She didn't seem to stop for breath as she went on. "April does seem to be a very cunning and caring kunoichi, Casey seems to be the selfless hero, and Splinter is the wisest teacher…present company excepted of course." She had the sense to amend quickly. "And Jennifer seems to be the powerful psychic ninja girl." She then took a deep breath and added, "I didn't see the Mutanimals or anyone else that is should end up in their family though but maybe if I go back again that will be different."

Lord Simultaneous sighed a bit. "That's enough Renet, off with you." He said. The young apprentice time mistress nodded a bit solemnly and walked off. After a moment he took a deep breath and said to himself, "It's a good thing Renet thinks so highly of them all. Even though she will have a massive effect on their lives, there's no way she could possibly understand the massive effect they will have all have on her life. What they will all mean to each other. And what is in store for them all." He started to leave now, knowing sooner rather than later Renet would most likely continue to put her own desires and opinions ahead of what she believed about time, and that was as it should be.

A little shorter than some I've done lately but I wanted to set the tone a bit for what I intend Renet, the turtles and everyone else, with more surprises to come, for both the good and the bad. Stay tuned for those revelations as they come and please remember to read, review, and offer suggestions on what you'd like to see.


	20. Demon Visit part 1

Disclaimer: Don't own TMNT, if it's in the series it's not mine.

Raph: Yeah, yeah, let's move on already.

It had seemed to get quieter over the last few days with the apparent death of Yen. As far as the city could tell gang activity seemed to have dwindled down to lower levels. However in the sewers the turtle team knew otherwise, as now the war was being fought in the shadows between the Foot and the Goldens. Of Fulcanelli and his demon horde their seemed to be no sign. If anyone really wanted to be honest about it they worried that something bad may have happened to Aaliyah and Candy but no one felt comfortable voicing their concern about potential bad guys.

Knowing that sooner or later the gang war would resurface even worse than ever Splinter only increased the team's training. Jennifer had the least experience and got the bulk of it but often times she was joined by her friend April, as well as Raphael and Donatello, the red masked turtle using this time to spend time with his girlfriend and the purple masked turtle spending time with the girl he wished were his girlfriend.

Other times it was a whole big training session, and those session not only encompassed the two girls and all four turtles but even their vigilante friend Casey Jones and their friends the Mighty Mutanimals. That had come about after Slash had admitted that he was working to train his team for the coming fights as well, especially Rockwell, Pete and Mondo Gecko.

After an afternoon group training session Casey, Mikey, and Pete slipped out to get pizzas while Donnie and Rockwell spent time figuring out what they could do from a technical angle. One approach was to see if they could use the dimensional portal device that Casey and April had obtained from the Kraang just before the worm quakes started to see if they could understand it and use it to their advantage as a last resort.

April and Jennifer were talking as they sparred while Raph and Leo blew off steam on the Space Heroes pinball machine. Slash and Leatherhead were watching TV. "So did Raph figure out how to take you on that 'real date' he was talking about?" April asked Jennifer as she swung her tessen at the blonde.

Jennifer blocked it with her baton; she had become adept at using her new weapons very quickly though of course she had practiced more in the last few days than most of the others had done in recent times. "I sort of 'ordered' him to put that on the back burner until this gang thing is done with." She swung at April and she dodged under it. "Dealing with my father and everyone else is more important now."

April laughed as she tried to land a kick at Jennifer's chest, but the girl was able to block it. "Ordered?" She questioned.

Now it was Jennifer's turn to laugh. "Okay, ordered isn't the right word. It's more like I made it clear that I wouldn't go on anything remotely fancy until this matter was settled." She admitted as she threw a couple punches at the red head, which she blocked easily. "It didn't hurt that Master Splinter agreed with me and that honestly I don't think Raph has figured out how to make it happen, so it's one less thing he has to stress over right now."

"You know, I'm kind of glad we're on equal footing here." April noted as Jennifer blocked the strike she had aimed at her shoulder. "Makes sparring interesting." In truth she was just the slightest bit jealous that the blonde was already at her level though she knew Jennifer had much more time to put into training sessions than April had, and on top of that the red head had literally started at the beginning whereas after seeing her use some of her gymnastics routines Master Splinter had decided their wasn't too much need to focus on agility and dexterity and to instead focus her on what she really lacked; offense and defense. "But I'm still worried that the two of us together won't be able to take on Karai when the time comes to freeing her."

"That's something I'm going to have to take your word on." Jennifer replied. "I've only seen her fight once, though that one time outside the museum already made me very wary."

"As it should." They heard Leo say from the entrance to the dojo. "Karai has trained longer than either of you. And as she is now hurting anyone won't be a concern for her." Leo gave the two girls a smile. "Not that it's not for lack of trying on your parts, you're both coming along well." He gestured his thumb toward the living room. "Mikey and the others are back with the pizza, we better eat now so we're ready for the next training session."

Both girls nodded, bowed to each other in respect, then sheathed their weapons and followed Leo out to the living room, where Leatherhead was passing out plates and Mikey was opening pizza boxes up. Mikey held up his hands, "A moment to reflect." He stated and leaned down to smell the boxes of pizza.

Raph punched Mikey's arm. "Quit being an idiot." The red masked turtle reprimanded. Mikey looked half annoyed and half hurt, though it was all for show. Then they started to dig into the pizza. Each of them knew not to disturb Splinter and to let him come eat when he was ready.

Fulcanelli knelt down in the small office, it would seem to anyone else as if the floor was on fire and in fact steam could be seen rising from the floor but if the man felt it he gave no sign of it. Instead he crossed his arms over his chest. "My master, I come before you as requested."

A vague outline could be seen from the shadows, though emanations around it suggested a portal of some kind rather than actually being in the room. A deep voice responded with, "It is time to move out and strike again. The Golden's are getting ready to bring Noi Tai Dar into your world, and that is something we cannot allow. No one must end that world as you know it before we get there. You must stop him."

"We will do what we can." Fulcanelli promised. "The mutant project has not gone as planned. The two girls aren't reliable and we may be disposing of them soon. The snake creature broke out and has vanished after only a minor incident that those turtles must have stopped. Nothing else has come around. Only Hector has become better than what we hoped."

"Irrelevant." The voice stated. "I was always certain that the mutant's would fail. To that end you naturally have my minions at your disposal."

"Very good, my lord." Fulcanelli replied. He didn't mention the jewel that Hector had returned with. The same amulet that had once allowed Yen to summon Dark Oni. They were now Hector's to command in the coming battles as well.

What neither Fulcanelli nor his mysterious benefactor noticed was that Aaliyah and Candy had been spying on them, neither trusting him. Aaliyah knew that Candy had quickly learned to be scared of him, and with good reason, but she had none the less knew it was important to find out what was going on. The last straw was now, learning that Fulcanelli was not just planning on becoming the gang leader of New York but that he had turned around and sold it out to demons. "We have to leave, and help the Turtles, regardless of these bracelets." Aaliyah whispered softly to her friend as she raised her right arm, where the metal bracelet was on her wrist. The axolotl girl nodded her agreement.

"Rockwell and I think we know how to help Aaliyah and Candy." Donnie said as he reached for his soda.

"Awesome." Mondo said. "How?"

"Destroy those bracelet thingies." Mikey said.

"We're talking a bit more specific at this time." Rockwell replied. He set his plate down so he could explain. "Both Donatello and myself developed a sort of micro bead that we can drop on the bracelets that will short them out and the resulting reaction will cause the metal to melt down."

"So we can do it right on the spot before they take off." Leo noted.

"Wicked." Casey replied.

"There incubating now and should be done in a few minutes." Donnie said. "We made enough for each of us just in case, since we have no idea who might encounter them at any time." Donnie set his soda down on the table. "There's also the idea that we might find other uses for them."

"Like disabling all of the drones that the big demon in Central Park awhile back was summoning." Rockwell supplied. "I hypothesize if we toss one of those into that portal that the demon was using as gateway to summon them, it should destroy them all."

"That would've been nice to have." Mikey said and Casey nodded in agreement.

"From what I've seen, April and Jennifer are coming along in their training well." Leo said. "They should be ready to save Karai soon, and they're more than ready to help us end this gang war when the time comes."

"I wish I felt as confident." Jennifer said.

"Me too." April agreed and then elaborated. "I mean not in terms of fighting, we're as good as we can be given the hurried circumstances. But to use our powers to force that mind control worm out of Karai, it's going to take a lot of energy that we have to extend just to fight her."

"Hey, I think you two can do it." Donnie said as he placed his hand on April's shoulder and squeezed gently. That brought a small smile to the red head's lips.

"Yeah, okay." Casey interrupted. "But when is that going to happen."

"Sooner than we all expected." They heard Splinter say as he came in from his room in the dojo. "I was meditating when I caught it on the astral plane. Chein Khan is going for his final move tonight." He stated as he looked between his sons, their human allies, and their mutant allies. Their family. "He is going to raise Noi Tai Dar from the underworld tonight and that demon intends to destroy this world."

"We have to stop Chein Khan from raising his demon." Both Leo and Slash stated at the same time, which caused Mikey, Casey and Pete to laugh at that.

"Yes." Splinter agreed. "We must. This is too big; I will be going with you to stop this." He looked to Jennifer. "And you…"

The blonde interrupted him. "Will stay and make sure the lair is safe, I understand."

"Do not interrupt." Splinter said to her sternly. "You will go as well, we all will. You must stick with April and hone your teamwork, for that is what you will need when the time comes to face, and hopefully rescue, Karai."

Now both girls nodded. "Hai, Sensei." They acknowledged.

"Where is Chein Khan going to bring that demon of his to this realm?" Raph asked his father.

"I do not know and that will be part of the challenge." Splinter answered. "Finish eating, you will all need your strength. Then we must find out where it is happening at."

"We'll cover more ground if we use the Shellraiser and the Party Wagon." Donnie said. "I think the Mutanimals should take the Shellraiser as well as Master Splinter. The rest of us will use the Party Wagon. We can use the T-phones to stay in contact with one another."

"A sound idea Donatello." Splinter agreed as he came down to eat with his family so they could prepare for the fight ahead.

About twenty minutes of eating and silence, each lost in their own thoughts about what this mission would mean especially if they failed, followed before they were ready to go. Splinter and the Mutanimals took the Shellraiser with Rockwell at the wheel. The turtle and their human allies took the Party Wagon with Casey at the wheel.

Shredder had known something was coming as well. First there were several conflicts between the Golden's and the dark figured ninjas before that stopped. Now the Golden's were clashing with his own army and it was a good thing that the Footbots were easily replaced because often enough his generals would often come back alone.

Then Stockman had revealed that based upon his research he believed that the dog faced leader of the Golden's wished to bring a demon into their world. Xever and Bradford had immediately dismissed that idea but both Steranko and Tiger Claw had been as quick to caution the Shredder that it could be real and not a figment of the mutant fly's imagination.

Shredder looked to his first two henchmen. "Things have been showing up that have been too bizarre as of late to dismiss the idea of one of them raising a demon." He stated. "In fact Tiger Claw said the ninja beings that Yen was using are similar to demons of Japanese legend."

"That is correct master." Tiger Claw said.

"And you spoke of that kind of thing when I was growing up as well father." Karai voiced from her position beside the Shredder's throne.

"Indeed I did my daughter." Shredder relented. "If only we knew what kind of demon that this Chein Khan was going to try to bring into this world. Most likely I imagine it would be one that would not be too keen on anything short of this world's destruction, with us as one of its primary targets."

"Then we must stop it before it comes to us master." Tiger Claw said.

"I agree." Shredder said. "Tonight each of you will take Footbots out, find the Golden's with Chein Khan in particular, and end them."

"I believe that in order to bring a demon to our world, Chein Khan will need a zzztrong zzzource of power. Mozzzt likely nuclear. The clozzzezzzt one would be the Indian Point Energy Center twenty five milezzz zzzouth of the Hudzzzon." Stockman stated.

"That would be insane." Bradford voiced. "Nuclear fallout would destroy a lot of the surrounding area before the demon could even get around to it."

"Karai, Tiger Claw, you two will take Footbots over to the Indian Point Center while the rest of you look over the city in case Stockman's deduction is wrong." Shredder ordered his army.

Each general bowed before the Shredder, rather or not they willingly wanted to serve him, and Karai left the Shredder's side to join Tiger Claw as they walked out. "Today the Golden's." Shredder vowed. "Tomorrow Hamato Yoshi and his accursed freaks."

Unfortunately Stockman's assessment was right. Chein Khan's men had already subdued the guards and workers of the energy center. Chein Khan was now perfecting the ritual that he was going to use to bring his demon master Noi Tai Dar into the world, guarded by a few white ninjas. He had over one hundred of his Golden's and another three dozen white ninja patrolling the grounds for the inevitable arrival of the turtles and their little gang at least. He had also considered the arrival of the Foot clan as well.

"Are we sure Master Splinter is right about this" Raph asked as he never the less polished one of his sai. "We've been at this for hours." Jennifer sat beside her red masked boyfriend.

"I'm getting hungry." Mikey added.

"We search until Master Splinter tells us to call it." Leo said to his brothers sternly. "And not before."

"Donatello." Rockwell's voice came from the speaker of his T-phone, as he was keeping the lines of communications open while Casey drove. "Leatherhead picked up Tiger Claw, Karai and the several dozen Footbots on the rooftops."

"We can't let ourselves get sidetracked." Casey commented.

"Agreed." Rockwell said. "The reason I brought this to your intention is that according to Leatherhead their ultimate destination is the Indian Point Energy Center."

"That's a nuclear built plant." Jennifer said. "South of the Hudson river if I remember right."

"Why go there?" Mikey wondered.

"To bring the demon into this world must require lots of energy." Donnie mused. "And if they don't care about the fallout involved in it a massive release of nuclear energy would cause just that."

"But that doesn't make any sense." April argued gently. "If that were the case wouldn't there have been a demon released during the Chernobyl incident. Why would this be different?"

"Who says a demon wasn't released then?" They heard Pete question from the Shellraiser.

Then from the speaker came Splinter's voice. "Ordinarily April would most likely be correct." He told them all. "But Chein Khan has been preparing for this for an unknown amount of time now. There is undoubtfully more to this than what we are seeing, most likely a ritual associated with the nuclear energy release."

"Almost as bad as the demon itself would be the nuclear fallout that would kill most of New York City." Leatherhead added.

"So we stop Chein Khan before he raises the demon and we end this particular threat." Leo declared. "Dr. Rockwell, Casey, let's go to the energy center."

Being on wheels allowed the group to arrive at the energy center first, but they took a moment to make sure that their vehicles were safely stashed. Although the Foot would find out sooner rather than later that they weren't the ones at the energy center they still would rather wait until the last moment for that revelation to hit.

Pete did a quick flyby over the nuclear plant and returned five minutes later. "No sign of any bulldogs." He reported to them all. "But there are more Golden's and White Ninja than I can count."

"That can't be too hard to accomplish." Raph commented sarcastically and received a glare from the blue masked turtle and a shake of her head from Jennifer, the latter of which almost seemed to make him regret the comment. Almost.

"This is Chein Khan's ace in the hole, as it were." Splinter reminded them all. "He has no doubt committed almost all of his forces, or perhaps even all of them, to this endeavor."

"What shall we do master?" Jennifer asked him.

"We wait for Tiger Claw and the Foot to attack." Splinter stated. "While they are going in on the frontal assault, and most likely taking on a brunt of the forces, we will go in after them from another side and work to find Chein Khan while dealing with those left behind."

It didn't take long. Tiger Claw and Karai showed up with the Footbots. "The fly was right." The mutant tiger stated. "The dog mutant has set up shop here." He looked to the Footbots. "Attack the Goldens." He looked to Karai. "You and I must deal with the White Ninjas." The kunoichi simply nodded in agreement and the Foot attacked.

"Karai." Splinter murmured. Leo had done the same thing.

"Master?" Jennifer questioned as she looked her rat teacher. "Shall April and I try to go after Karai?"

After a moment Splinter shook his head. "No. If the opportunity presents itself that is one thing, but we are here to stop Chein Khan from raising his demon." He decided.

"Let's hope that Karai can stay alive then." Raph said.

They took their own entrance into the energy plant, quickly dispatching of the few Golden's and the one white ninja at their location. As Splinter had predicted they had diverted most of their forces to the Foot's frontal assault.

Then a group of Golden's when flying to the ground with some of them a little burnt up. "What now?" Mikey asked.

It seemed to shamble out slowly on feet that seemed to resemble an elephant's although it's were smaller but it was bigger than anything they had seen so far except for the four legged one Mikey, Casey, and Rockwell had seen in the Central Park. It roared at them with yellow teeth gleaming in its mouth and glared with red eyes that contrasted with its pasty, and April had to admit corpse like, skin. Attached to its arms were two cannon like objects, with coils strapped to the cannons that lead onto the creature's back. It roared at them again and fired the cannon objects, releasing fireballs alternately from left to right from the cannons at them.

"Chein Khan has never had anything like that before." Slash noted.

"No, it has to belong to my father." Jennifer answered. "I have a bad feeling somewhere around here some of my father's demons are fighting with the Golden's as well."

"Fulcanelli doesn't want Noi Tai Dar invading this world any more than we do I guess." Leo noted.

"Grand." Raph replied and shook his head. "How do we stop this demon?"

Slash used his mace to slam right through one of the fireballs as Leatherhead dodged from another side. The two strongest of the team leapt out and tried to prevent the demon from firing again but its strength and bulk matched those of the two larger mutants and flung them off.

"This is not going well." Pete noted. As Slash and Leatherhead quickly recovered from the toss off, the demon started firing at them again.

"If only we could get in close to this thing." Donnie noted. "I think we could prevent its attacks by destroying the thing on its back."

April tried to throw one of her tessen at it but the demon used on of its cannons to easily knock the small object off course.

Aaliyah and Candy followed through the hole the demon had made to see the fight the group was facing against the demon. "It's good with those it can see." Aaliyah noted. "But let's see what it does about those from behind."

"What's the plan?" Candy asked the turtle girl.

"You're quicker; I think you should dodge under its legs to trip it up. Then I can rupture that tank and hopefully destroy that demon." Aaliyah responded.

"Great. Piece of cake." Candy drawled. She none the less dodged out of the shadows and then got on all fours, moving swiftly in between the small stubbly like legs of the demon. It tripped over her just as the female turtle had predicted. She then drew her bunrei's jumped up, digging her weapons into the tank.

Donnie got it. "She's trying to rupture the tank, hoping it will kill the demon." He announced.

"It might also kill her." Leo added as he took out his grappling gun. He aimed it at one of the towers and shot the grapple out. It struck the edge and Leo moved to reel it in. As he did his arm wrapped around Aaliyah's waist just as her plan came to be and the tank ruptured.

The shockwave knocked everyone back. Raph made sure Jennifer was secure in his arms and that she landed on top of him. Donnie had April in his arms and made sure his body and more importantly his shell blocked the shockwave from hitting her. Candy flew but she half landed and half crashed into Mondo Gecko and ended up on top of him as well.

Leo and Aaliyah were now against the tower roof. "That was a boomtastic idea." The blue masked turtle noted to the white masked turtle.

Aaliyah shrugged. "Maybe not the brightest of moves but it got the job done." She replied.

"Let's not repeat that process." Leo decided as they lowered themselves to the ground and joined the others.

"So you two plan on running off again?" Raph questioned.

Aaliyah shook her head. "No." She replied. "Fulcanelli isn't just planning on taking over the New York gangs or even the city itself. He wants to unleash hell upon earth."

"Like Chein Khan." Slash said. "So are these demons helping Khan or is he working to stop him too?"

"Stop him I think." Candy answered the giant black masked turtle. "I think the demon he's trying to bring to Earth is different from the demon Khan is trying to bring here."

"If you're intent on leaving my father, we can help." Jennifer said to the two mutant females. "Donnie and Professor Rockwell developed something that will disrupt and destroy those bracelets my father forced you to wear."

"Sounds good to me." Candy agreed.

"Let's do it." Aaliyah agreed as both girls held up their wrists.

Leo took one of the pellets out and applied it to Aaliyah's bracelet while Donnie did the same for Candy. Just as they had promised the bracelets short circuited and then melted off their wrists, slapping onto the pavement with a wet sound.

"We got a dog to stop." Raphael said to the two female mutants. "You want to come out help out, feel free."

Now with the two female mutants in tow, the team headed out to find Chein Khan.

Two of the same demons attacked the Golden's and the Foot. Karai quickly speculated how to defeat them and Tiger Claw ordered the Footbots to do so, not worrying so much about the 'sacrifice' that would entail.

"There has to be more around here somewhere." Karai decided.

"That is not all." Tiger Claw announced to her. "I smell the rat. Which means the turtles and their friends are here as well."

"I say let them confront Chein Khan then and if they fail we'll pick up the pieces." Karai said.

Tiger Claw nodded. "Yes, let them be at the center if this fails. Even if somehow they survived the radiation they would not survive the demon." He agreed.

"Soon you shall rise." Chein Khan said to what seemed to be thin air. "And you will feast upon the souls of New York City, be they dead from the nuclear fallout or be it after you have risen and killed them yourselves."

The door was broken open and the group entered. "I don't think so Khan." Leo said. "We won't let you destroy the city or the world."

Chein Khan laughed. "You're too late fools." He announced as he revealed a palm sized device in his hands. "A man on my payroll preset one of the towers with my explosives. While you and whoever else happened to try to crash the party in an attempt to stop me and my army to prevent your 'disaster' those pieces were long in place." He waved the palm sized device slightly. "All I need to do is push this button and the deed is done. My prayer has been given; my sacrifice will soon be done. Noi Tai Dar will rise and you can do nothing to stop me."

April had the thought this might be a good time for her and Jennifer to test their powers. After all if they were wrong it wouldn't matter because they would all die of radiation and the world would follow after Noi Tai Dar rose. She took Jennifer's hand and the blonde only glanced at her before realizing what she was thinking and gave a subtle nod of agreement.

"You must be crazy." Slash said. "You and your army will be killed too."

Both girls concentrated on the device but didn't want to move it until they were as sure as it was possible to be.

"That's where you're wrong." Chein Khan responded. "I am protected by my master. I will serve by his side when this world is no more. The white ninja aren't really in a position to care. As for the Golden's…well as I say my sacrifices will soon be done."

"That's loyalty for ya." Raph said disgusted.

"You're just pathetic." Aaliyah stated, but Chein Khan only laughed at that.

"It's over." Chein Khan announced. He moved to press on the device but at that point it flew from his hands as if a ghost had grabbed it. It went sailing end over end for a about ten seconds before landing on the ground, making a small watch battery pop out and make the entire thing shut down.

"No!" Chein Khan howled out. He rushed forward to try to grab it, but without that as insurance Leatherhead gave a roar of his own and smashed right into the bull dog mutant.

More of the demons had shown up and Tiger Claw had sent more of the Footbots to detonate their packs regardless of their existence.

"Something isn't right here." Karai said to him. "Why are there so many of them? Why are they letting themselves be destroyed like? We know there are more demons besides these things that could be acting as protection for them?"

"Now it's over." Leo said to Chein Khan.

"Do you take me for a fool?" He questioned as he stood up and watched Leatherhead for his next move. "It's not quite the same result as the fall out I would have wanted, but I heard those explosions outside. He responded just as Noi Tai Dar expected. Those explosions the Foot set off were close enough to the tower for my secondary purpose."

"Sounds like a fool to me." Raph noted.

"Oh, no." Donnie gasped. "That might be just enough for Noi Tai Dar to come into our world after all. And Karai and Tiger Claw don't even realize it."

"Raph, April, Jennifer, Slash, Aaliyah, Donnie come with me." Leo ordered. "We have to stop the Foot from rupturing anymore of those demons."

"The rest of us need to put Chein Khan down permanently." Casey surmised.

"Correct." Splinter agreed.

The ones called for followed out. Splinter just hoped that they would focus on the task at hand rather than the fact it put them in easy reach to help Karai. As much as he wanted his daughter home again he knew now was not the time for it.

Tiger Claw considered the words that Shredder's cub had given. He had to admit something seemed off here and he immediately called for the Footbots to stop, but in that time six more of the demons had been dealt with in the same way. "But was that quick enough." He wondered to himself.

As they were approaching Leo noticed smoke coming from the tower. "Is it supposed to do that Donnie?" The fearless leader asked the smartest turtle.

"No." Donnie answered simply.

The black smoke seemed to intentionally cause a crack to form from the top to the bottom of the tower reactor and once it reached bottom parts of it blew out. Through the smoke emerged a creature as big and as well built as Leatherhead, its skin all black with red glowing eyes. It flexed its hands and claws scraped against the wall of the tower.

"Ah, sewer apples." Raph muttered. "We're too late."

"The demon." Tiger Claw growled.

"I AM NOI TAI DAR." The black demon exclaimed. "I HAVE COME FROM THE UNDERWORLD, TREMBLE IN FEAR AS I CONSUME YOUR SOULS." It then laughed as the black smoke vanished, seemingly preventing them from sending this demon back to the underworld from whence he had come.

How can the turtles and their allies stop this demon? Can the Foot and the team work together? Will the two girls use this chance to bring Karai back? Things coming up.


	21. Demon Visit part 2

Disclaimer: Don't own TMNT, if it's on the show it isn't mine. Moving on.

Jennifer couldn't help but shudder, not only at the demon's voice but at his words. She had yet to decide how much she believed when it came to existential matters but just the idea behind his words was enough to give her that reaction.

"Sorry, pal. No souls for you today." Raph said as he drew his sais. "But we can offer you plenty of beatings though."

"SUCH INTERESTING CREATURES." Noi Tai Dar noted with a laugh. "THIS WORLD HAS CHANGED SINCE I HAVE LAST SET FOOT UPON IT." He gave them a malicious smile. "I EAGERLY AWAIT THE TASTING OF YOUR SOULS."

"This thing is just creepy." Karai decided. "Footbots, destroy him."

The Footbots started to attack the demon but much to their shock he tore through them like they were nothing. "UNSATISFYING." The demon declared. "THEY POSSESS NO SOULS TO FEAST UPON."

April exchanged looks of unease with Jennifer and Donatello. "I don't like this at all." She said.

"We still have to stop it." Aaliyah declared. "Here and now before it gets into the city."

"It's more than that." Leo clarified. "There has to be workers here somewhere that are being held that are in more immediate danger."

"YOU SHOULD BE MORE CONCERNED FOR YOUR THREE HUMAN COMPANIONS." Noi Tai Dar pointed out. "BOTH THE GIRLS HERE AND THE BOY NOT TO FAR TO THE EAST." They knew he had to be referring to Casey Jones.

"We can take care of ourselves, tar boy." April said to him. The demon only laughed at her.

"COME THEN, FIGHT ME AND SEE WHERE IT LANDS ALL OF YOU." The black demon challenged.

"I feel his power." Chein Khan declared with a laugh. "My master is here and ready to consume your souls and inhabit your world." He looked at the remaining team members. "All of your efforts were in vain."

"No." Splinter said. "You are wrong. We will stop that demon once and for all."

Casey dropped a hockey puck on the ground. "Goongala!" He declared as he shot it straight at Chein Khan's face.

He moved to block it but was interrupted by Mikey's shout of, "Booyakasha!" and Mondo's shout of "Cowabunga!" and they both slammed into him, one with a kick and one with a skateboard. He stumbled back again and Leatherhead rampaged toward him, forcing him to slam into the wall which promptly collapsed on the bull dog mutant.

"Is he down?" Candy asked.

"I can't imagine anyone surviving that." Rockwell declared.

"Regardless, he is no longer our top concern." Splinter replied. "If Chein Khan's words are to believed Noi Tai Dar is free and we must find a way to stop him. To that end we must join the other half of our team."

No one argued and everyone followed the rat master out as he left the half decimated building.

"Enough talking then." Raph decided as he ran forward and tried to stab Noi Tai Dar with his sais. The demon dodged back and kicked the red masked turtle hard in the stomach. He was sent backwards and crashed into the two girls.

Karai tried now, running toward the demon. She swiped her tonta at him but he grabbed the small blade in his hand and crushed it before dropping it. He swung at Karai and she dodged it. Her right hand formed into that of a snake and she used it to bite him.

"Never thought I'd be happy to see her poison someone." Donnie noted.

Noi Tai Dar laughed. "YOUR POISON IS INEFFEICTIVE ON ME, LITTLE WORM." He revealed and then took her by her snake arm and tossed her against the tower wall hard.

"Let's see how you handle someone more your size then." Slash decided and ran toward the demon. He swung his mace at the black skinned creature but he blocked it by taking a hold of the pointed end, and then slammed the handle into the black masked turtle's face. He then grabbed him by his arms and tossed him hard into some Footbots.

"I GUESS I HANDLED SOMEONE MORE MY SIZE RATHER WELL." The demon mocked with a laugh.

"I think it's time we try a double attack then." Aaliyah said as she looked over at Leo. "Shall we?"

The blue masked leader of the team nodded. "Let's shall." He agreed. The two turtles rushed toward the demon with their weapons and then leapt up, intending to basically quadruple slash him from each of their bladed weapons. The demon raised his arm to let the blades dig into his flesh, and then pulled his arm back before lashing forward and lifting both of them up by their throats and then tossing them. Leo crashed into Slash as he tried to rise as Aaliyah crashed again into Raph and the girls as they were getting up.

"Enough with these cubs then, demon." Tiger Claw declared. "Let's see how you handle a real warrior."

"Real warrior?" Raph questioned in derision.

"Right now Raph I don't think we can question the source that is actually trying to help us stop this thing." April pointed out to him.

Tiger Claw leapt at the demon with a vicious swipe of claws that probably would have dismembered an arm if it had connected but Noi Tai Dar stepped to the side. He intended to deliver a an elbow to the mutant cat but Tiger Claw expertly moved under it before he pulled two blades of his own and moved to attack the demon again. Noi Tai Dar jumped past him, landing on two other Footbots and claiming the blades for his own.

"Hate to say it but he's doing better than we are so far." Leo said.

"Yes, but unless Tiger Claw can pull of a miracle here something tells me we're going to need to come up with another idea, and soon." Donnie replied as the rest of the team joined them.

"Is everyone okay?" Casey asked as he looked to April and the others.

"We're still alive and nothing is broken, so that's something." The red head replied.

Splinter took a deep breath. "Donatello, Professor Rockwell. You said in the lair that you might have an idea; see what you can do to implement it." He ordered. "I will try to work with Tiger Claw in whatever capacity I can against this demon." He looked to the others. "As for the rest of you…" He started.

"The rest of you can worry about us." Karai declared as she was joined by even more Footbots, as well as Rocksteady and Rahzar. "If we can't take this demon down we can at least make sure that father doesn't have you to worry about either."

"I guess the rest of us will deal with the Foot." Leo said.

"And them." Mikey added as he saw the approach of more of the Golden's and even a few white ninjas.

Splinter ran over to help Tiger Claw as Leatherhead and Slash decided to stay close to Donnie and Rockwell so they could concentrate on a plan unimpeded. That left the four mutant turtles, Mondo Gecko, Pigeon Pete, the three human fighters, and the two female mutants to deal with the Foot. Mondo split off with Casey and the two female mutants to deal with the Goldens.

"So we meet again, princess." Karai said as she approached April. She recovered a sword dropped by the kamikaze Footbots from earlier. "I'll take you and your little blonde friend out right now."

"We won't let you do this Karai." April said as she and Jennifer each took out their weapons.

"Ooh, the little blonde is packing some clubs now." Karai mocked. "Impressive."

"Is she always this charming?" Jennifer questioned.

"Actually, yes." April answered. Then the foot Kunoichi ran forward to engage the two girls.

Tiger Claw and Noi Tai Dar were clashing blades when Splinter came in from the side and kicked the demon in the side, disarming the demon from that side. He twirled around his staff and stood beside Tiger Claw.

"I don't require your help rodent." Tiger Claw stated.

"Perhaps you do not." Splinter replied back. "But you have it."

Tiger Claw hesitated for just a second. "Perhaps we have more important matters at the moment then. But I will make sure you pay for everything you have done soon." The mutant tiger declared before both turned to deal with Noi Tai Dar.

"This is almost like playing a video game on easy." Mondo Gecko declared as he skateboarded past a few of the Golden's, smacking them with his tail along the way.

"Don't underestimate them." Aaliyah reminded them. "Too much of that and it might be the last thing that you do." She had her bunrei out and were also none the less taking them down easily, and too boot she had also taken out a white ninja.

Leonardo was clashing with Rahzar, katana to claw, each seemingly as sharp as the other while Raphael was dealing with Rocksteady dodging his horn and hammer attacks while getting hits of his own in.

"Something seems wrong here." Donnie said as he took out two Footbots.

"What do you mean?" Mikey asked his third oldest brother as he took out one of his own.

"I mean…" Donnie started as he used his bo staff as a hockey stick of his own to slap a few Footbot parts toward a spot just as soon as three laser blasts came from nowhere. "That it was odd to see Rocksteady without his partner Bebop."

"Stop calling me that, reptile." The mutant warthog who was born Anton Zeck exclaimed as he appeared from thin air courtesy of his stealth device. "I ain't no Bebop, I hate that name. I hate it!"

"Would you prefer Pork Rind?" Mikey asked him as he turned his nunchuck into Kusarigama and threw them at the mutant warthog, tripping him up.

"It's starting to get just a little more crowded for my tastes." Slash said as he used his mace to slam into the Footbots that were trying to head their way.

"I can't disagree with that one my friend." Leatherhead announced as he punched two Footbots that came his way and then grabbed the one that had landed on his back and hurled it hard onto the floor.

Aaliyah was glad that her axolotl friend, the masked vigilante, and the other two Mutanimals seemed to be holding their own because she saw that some others needed help. Karai had quickly disarmed Jennifer and had even cut her leg which had caused her to fall to the ground and was now clashing with April. The red head was barely holding her own.

"Face it O'Neil, I am just too good for you to win." Karai stated as the red head barely dodged a sword swipe. "And your little friend clearly has more training to do if she somehow survives this night. Footbots are nothing compared to me." She kicked April hard in the shins and then brought up her elbow into the red head's chin. She fell hard and Karai raised her sword. "Time to say goodnight."

Her descending blade caught against a scythe blade, one of the bunrei that belonged to Aaliyah. "Sorry." The mutant female turtle said. "But this is going to be a late night." She glanced at April. "Help your friend."

April nodded and limped over to Jennifer. The blonde herself couldn't even stand right now though the red head knew her unique physiology would allow her to heal that up in a matter of minutes, which they now had thanks to the female turtle.

"Nice move." Karai allowed. "Let's see if you can capitalize on those." The kunoichi went into several strikes that she knew April would have been hard pressed to block, if she could've at all. The mystery girl turtle in front of her had no such trouble.

"Keep pressing me and find out what I can do." Aaliyah threatened.

"No!" April called out. "She's Master Splinter's daughter. We can't kill her, we have to help her."

Aaliyah gave out a small sigh of frustration. That did tie her hands but she did understand they had to help if at all possible. "Alright then, time for a change of tactics." She decided. She instead went with matching the girl move for move and hoping the others found a solution before she tired out.

Noi Tai Dar recovered easily from the hit and attacked the two mutants again, disarming Tiger Claw of his blades. The mutant tiger then pulled out his blasters and started to shoot at the demon, alternating between fire and ice, though the demon easily dodged it. He caught Splinter's foot as he tried to jump kick him and tossed him, though the rat master recovered quickly.

"I hope you two have a pretty good plan." Slash called back to Donnie and Rockwell. "We're going to be running out of steam here soon, and that assumes Noi Tai Dar doesn't get the better of Master Splinter and Tiger Claw before that."

"We're just working out a couple last details." Rockwell said to him. "Try to hold on."

"We are trying." Leatherhead assured him.

"Can we try to force that thing out of Karai now?" April asked Jennifer.

Jennifer took a deep breath. "I don't know." She said. The cut was just deep enough to be messing with her concentration. "We can try." She took the red head's hand.

Leo was still clashing with Rahzar when a puck hit him in the head, and the blue masked turtle leapt up and kicked Rahzar in the face, causing the double mutated dog demon to fall to the ground and then turned to see Casey. "White ninjas; gone. Golden's; running." Casey reported to him.

"Great, we could use some backup here." Leo said.

Pete dive-bombed Rocksteady, causing him to drop the hammer and take a hold of the mutant pigeon. That allowed Raph to give him a stiff uppercut.

"Like clearing a video game on easy." Mondo Gecko stated as he slammed right into Bebop, and then hit him with his tail and allowing Mikey to follow up with a clothesline from his Kusarigama to knock the breath out of the mutant warthog.

April and Jennifer concentrated on Karai as she battled Aaliyah, neither girl gaining ground in their fight. But after a few more moments Karai hesitated and then let out a cough as if trying to expel something from her lungs.

This did not go unnoticed by Tiger Claw and as Splinter was distracted again by Noi Tai Dar the mutant cat abandoned that fight. Without warning he struck, knocking into Aaliyah hard and sending her flying into the two girl's, disrupting their psychic hold. Karai passed out and he took her unconscious body onto his shoulder. "Fall back." He ordered the generals. "Footbots, finish this off." He then left with Karai. Rahzar, Rocksteady and Bebop followed.

"So much for them." Raph said. "Figures."

"Okay, we're ready." Donnie announced.

"Good." Slash said. He looked to the turtles. "You guys go help Master Splinter. Mutanimals, let's help Casey and the turtles finish the Footbots off." He hesitated only a second as he realized that Candy was neither a turtle nor a Mutanimal but was here to help as well. "You help us as well Candy." He added.

The black masked turtle's team mates and the axolotl girl nodded as they headed off.

"What do we need to do?" Leo asked Donnie.

"Rockwell and I modified this Kraang portal to go on an infinite loop." The purple masked turtle explained to his brothers. "All we need to do is get Noi Tai Dar through the portal and then shut this device down."

"Um, how does that help us?" Mikey asked.

Raph smacked him upside the head. "The portal is going to keep going and he'll be stranded going through realities forever." The red masked turtle translated.

"Without him ever being able to come out of it." Leo added and he nodded. "Good plan Donnie. Now let's make it so."

The four turtles ran to aid their father. Splinter was still holding his own against Noi Tai Dar but was finding it harder to do now that he was on his own for the moment. Donnie activated the Kraang portal and tossed it right over the reactor tower where the black skinned demon had first emerged.

"YOU THREE TURTLES COME AGAIN TO FACE ME?" The demon questioned with a smirk. "AND YOU BRING ANOTHER? I EXPECT FEASTING ON YOUR SOULS WILL BE EXQUISITE."

"Sorry, Not Toy Dar." Mikey responded, though it was anyone's guess whether he mangled the demon's name on accident or purpose. "Our souls will be staying right where they are, thank you very much." He twirled his nunchucks.

"Raphael, Michelangelo, go high. Leonardo and Donatello, go low. I will go for the middle." Master Splinter ordered his sons. They did just that. Noi Tai Dar was only able to deflect half of the attacks from the turtles and stumbled back at the attack from Splinter.

"ENOUGH!" Noi Tai Dar bellowed. From his red eyes he shot a blast of energy that struck Splinter full on in the chest and he fell back, trying to catch his breath again.

"Master Splinter." April gasped.

The four turtles came over to check on their father. "You're going to regret that." Raph stated.

"I AM WAITING, MUTANT." Noi Tai Dar spat.

"Let's try the power of six." Aaliyah suggested as she came up with Casey Jones. Jennifer and April were with them and they each knelt down to check on Splinter.

Leo nodded. "Donnie and Casey, go low. Raph and Mikey, go high. Aaliyah you and I will go for the middle." He looked to the turtle girl. "We need to get him into that portal."

All of the turtles and Casey nodded. They went at it again. This time Noi Tai Dar blocked the attack from the red masked turtle and the orange masked turtle. The purple masked turtle and the masked vigilante slid just a bit past him and used their respective weapons to bring the demon's legs out from underneath him. As he started to trip the blue masked turtle and the white masked turtle double jump kicked him and with a stumble he fell back through the portal. Rockwell used his psychic abilities to close the Kraang portal down.

"Booyakasha!" Mikey exclaimed. "We did it! Tar boy is gone."

"But we failed to rescue Karai." Jennifer said as she looked sadly to her teacher and if she were honest with herself the man that almost seemed to her like a father.

Splinter gently placed his hand on her cheek. "Do not fret Jennifer. You two will succeed." He promised. "I know it."

"It will." Aaliyah said as Casey and five turtles joined them. "Next time they won't have to worry about anything but focusing on whatever they need to do for her. I'll keep your daughter out of their reach until then."

"That means you're staying?" Mikey asked her.

The white masked female turtle nodded. "Yeah. I guess I am." She answered.

"Don't know about her, but I have no place to go." Candy said.

"Casey, April, Jennifer." Splinter addressed their human companions. "Go free the people that are held here."

"How do we find them?" Casey asked.

"I think Jennifer and I can sense them out." April told him and the blonde nodded in agreement.

"Return to the Party Wagon and return home with the turtles. I will go in the Shellraiser with the Mutanimals." Splinter added.

"What about us?" Candy asked, a little frightened that they were being abandoned.

"You may go with whoever you like." Splinter told the two.

"I'll stay with your sons." Aaliyah volunteered, April thought a bit too quickly with amusement.

"I'll meet you at wherever they're going then." Candy declared. "I'll go with Mondo and the Mutanimals." The female turtle rolled her eyes a bit and smiled. She suspected her axolotl friend might be developing an attraction to the skateboarding gecko and only hoped for her sake it was mutual.

The three humans ran off as Leatherhead aided a slightly limping Splinter to the Shellraiser, the turtles headed toward the Party Wagon and sat for a few minutes after the Shellraiser had driven off. Just as Raph was getting antsy the three humans came back. Jennifer got in back with Raph followed by a peck on the cheek and cuddling up to him. April and Casey were in front as Casey drove off.

From the rubble Chein Khan pushed his way through. "This isn't over yet." He vowed. "Noi Tai Dar seems to have been defeated but I will have our revenge."

"The demon is long gone." Tiger Claw said as he knelt before Shredder. "Chein Khan was not directly seen though it can be assumed the turtle's removed him from the fight."

"Like their rat master, they do not have the stomach to finish the fight." Shredder declared. "I have no doubt that when we take the fight to them he will return." He then changed track. "What happened with Karai?"

"She bested the red headed worm rider easily." Tiger Claw noted with some pride. He didn't even bother mentioning the blonde that accompanied her. "But I do not know where the female turtle came from but she is as skilled as Karai. As she fought the turtle girl she suddenly reacted as if she were going to expel the worm though I do not know how or why."

Shredder seemed aggravated by that. "Have Stockman reinforce the control over Karai in preparation for the final fight and instruct Bradford to make sure we have enough Footbots." He rose from his throne. "I will prepare the heralds. Fulcanelli will undoubtfully have a large mutant army for the coming, the final confrontation."

The parties reconvened at the lair and both mutant females seemed impressed. Aaliyah whistled a bit. "A genuine Space Heroes pinball machine." She said in awe. "I haven't seen one of these since I was six."

"I've got the high score." Mikey volunteered happily.

"You watch Space Heroes?" Leo asked, further intrigued by this girl.

"One of my guilty pleasures." Aaliyah admitted with a small blush.

"Great." Raph said as he threw up his left hand. His right arm was around his blonde girlfriend.

"I suggest you all stay here tonight." Splinter said to the Mutanimals, the two female mutants, and the two human companions who did no already live here. "It will be safer and I suspect it will not be long before we must deal with Shredder and Fulcanelli."

"We still don't know that Chein Khan is truly out of the picture either." Slash noted. "We might have to deal with the Golden's still as well."

"All the more reason than man." Raph said.

"Good thing we've got enough food for all of us for dinner and breakfast." Jennifer noted softly. "I'm sorry I wasn't able to help much out there."

"You did fine." Raph told her. "Karai is one tough fighter, we all know that from experience."

"She totally had me the first time we met, except for I threw her off her game when I mentioned my mother is gone." April assured her.

"You have taken on many things very well." Splinter also assured the lithe blonde. "No one expects you to beat a kunoichi as skilled and well trained as my daughter."

"You did a great job doing that though." Leo said to Aaliyah.

"I've been practicing martial arts since I was four." The female turtle said. "Back when I was human."

Donnie nodded. "We remember hearing about that when the news was reporting your disappearance." He reminisced. "Once this is over, I can see what I can do about making you and Candy human again if you like."

The look in both girls' eyes showed they were indeed considering it but all Aaliyah said was, "When this is over. Let's worry about that first."

"Leonardo." Splinter said to his eldest son. "Make sure Aaliyah is properly suited up." He was of course referring to the fact aside from her white mask she was basically what passed for naked as a turtle.

"Hai, Sensei." Leo said and turned to Aaliyah. "We've got pads for you and spare tape." He turned to show her the way and Aaliyah followed.

"I better get dinner started." Mikey declared.

Jennifer kissed Raph on the cheek before pulling away. "I'll give you a hand Mikey, we've got a lot of people to cook for." She volunteered.

Splinter watched as they all started to divide up again. Donatello and Rockwell were of course headed toward the lab again. April went to give Mikey and Jennifer a hand as well. Pete flew up to the tire swing to rest. The remaining members of the group drifted to the TV and ended up watching a rerun of Super Mecha Robo Force Five, with Mondo and Candy sitting pretty close to each other.

As he went into the dojo he saw Leo leaning against the tree as Aaliyah was 'suiting' up to match the rest of the turtles for the time being. Splinter also noted with amusement that the two of them were already discussing a sparring session together and suspected that they might develop into something more if his eldest son had finally gotten over the attraction he had initially held for Karai.

"Some interesting times are definitely ahead." The rat master decided with affection for his family and friends, old and new alike.

The final fight in the gang war is almost upon us. Will Aaliyah be able to fulfill the promise of helping rescue Karai? What will the mutant girls decide about returning to human? Is Chein Khan out of the fight? Is Noi Tai Dar really gone? Stay tuned.


	22. The War Is On part 1

Donnie: Remember Myra does not own TMNT or anything else that you see on the show, only anything that you don't see…how's that for a disclaimer?

Raph: (rolls eyes) Wonderful, Donnie. Let's move on.

Only a couple of days passed since the team had stopped Chein Khan from bringing Noi Tai Dar to Earth. With Aaliyah volunteering to help bring Karai back home, Splinter focused on having Jennifer and April use their powers to take an item off of a fighter while they were busy sparring against the female turtle. At first it was Casey but after a few rounds it was decided she needed someone more on Karai's fighting skill level and concentration level and Leo began to spar with her instead. It made things harder for the two girls but they soon learned how to deal with it and it was agreed their chances of helping Splinter's daughter increased exponentially.

Not long after the last practice the group had just settled down and April had just gotten her T-phone to order pizzas when the proximity alarms Donnie had set around the lair after the team had discovered Hector knew where they lived at went off.

"What now?" Raph asked irritably as he rose and drew his sais. Jennifer had been sitting right next to him and she stood as well though she did not draw her batons.

"Wow." Casey breathed as he saw a flaming skull with horns come around the corner and levitate there. "Is that some weird looking mutant or a small demon?"

"A demon of course." Said a voice from the skull. It sounded like Fulcanelli Quinn's voice, Jennifer's father. "What else do you think it would be?"

"Your dad's really a flaming skull?" Mikey asked the blonde, shocked.

Raph punched his youngest brother in the arm as Donnie shook his head, "No shell brains, he's using this thing as a puppet." He answered.

"But it's a skull…" Mikey started to reply.

"Guys." Leo hissed as his youngest siblings, his katana blades already drawn. He pointed one of those blades right at the horned skeleton head. "What do you want Fulcanelli?"

"I've come to issue you a challenge." The skeletal head responded. "Meet us on 1st avenue in two hours."

"What if we don't feel like it?" Raph asked. "Why should we do what you want?"

"Because if you don't then your stubbornness will result in thousands of demons arriving in this city and destroying it." The flaming skull replied. "Your choice, meet me as I demand or let the demons take this city and all of its people. Trust me when I say that even the dead will not rest."

"I don't think he's lying." Jennifer said to them.

The flaming skull laughed and then rushed straight toward Jennifer, opening its teeth as if his puppet master had commanded him to take a bite out of his daughter. Before even Raph could respond to that threat the blonde drew one of her batons, extended the blade from inside of her weapon, and brought it up just in enough time to impale the small demon which promptly burst into nothing.

"Nice." April said approvingly.

"Very." Raph agreed, impressed.

"What do we Master?" Leo asked Splinter.

Splinter looked at his sons, Aaliyah, the Mutanimals, and their three human friends. "We do not have a choice but to meet with Fulcanelli as he wishes." He announced.

"Bummer, dinner postponement." Mikey sighed.

"We'll have to eat later Mikey." Leo said to the orange masked turtle. "We need to get going to 1st avenue and see if we can stop Fulcanelli before he does whatever he plans on doing."

"I doubt we can." Jennifer cautioned her friends. "I bet my father has set up whatever he intends to do before he ever made his challenge."

"Only one way to find out." Rockwell said to them as he levitated up a bit. "Let's get to 1st avenue then."

They all left the lair. The Mutanimals, Candy and Splinter took the Shellraiser while the five turtles and their three human companions took the Party Wagon and made the drive to 1st avenue. As they were going Pet asked them, "Do we even know what we're looking for?"

That drew hesitation from everyone, including Jennifer. No one really had an answer to that one. "In the past we've never seen how the demon's actually come into our universe." Donnie finally noted.

"Maybe they summon like necromancers." Mikey suggested.

Raph was about to respond when Rockwell interrupted, "Actually that is a good suggestion Michelangelo. They may have certain items or marking that would allow them to summon those demons."

"The problem is if that's how it happens then how do we stop any of them from summoning those damn demons?" Casey asked, sounding kind of frustrated at the prospect as he took a right turn.

"There's only one way I know of." Slash answered. "Take them out of the equation. Permanently."

"Killing them should be a last resort." Leo said to all of them as he looked at Jennifer. "And let's not forget one of those men is Jennifer's father."

"We cannot spare him just because of that." Splinter reminded his son, and to an extent the blonde girl that was dating his red masked son. "Remember that if our positions are ever to be reversed he would not hesitate to kill us all."

"Except Jennifer." Mikey added absentmindedly. "Hector wants her alive for rea sons we don't really want to consider."

"Then why'd you bring it up?" Raph snapped at his youngest brother.

"Enough you two." Leo interrupted his youngest sibling. "Look, let's assess the situation and then go through our options from there." No one objected to that course of action even though most expected that to be a delaying tactic at best.

It wasn't more than ten minutes before they parked in an alley and then headed toward the rooftops to look around the area undetected from the unknown populous. By this time most people were off the streets but of course in New York it was rarely deserted.

They jumped a few rooftops without much luck figuring out where to go.

"Okay, let's think this thing through." Donnie said as they stopped at the fourth rooftop.

"That leaves Mikey out." Raph noted. Jennifer gave him a quiet shush look and he rolled his eyes slightly but nodded. "Fine, so what are we thinking through?"

"As far as we know the only way Fulcanelli could have demons already here is if they're stored and waiting for orders." Donnie said.

"They never seemed like the stay and wait for orders type." April noted.

"No." Aaliyah agreed. "But Fulcanelli had one warehouse where he had his lab set up, along where he stayed with us and his two goons."

"That means he could have other warehouses somewhere." Candy said. "But it'd have to be a big one if it housing all sorts of those demon things."

"How many of those are there?" Mondo Gecko asked as he twirled his skateboard on his tail. Candy found that kind of amusing.

"Not too many." Donnie thought. "In fact the only one I can think of is a storage warehouse that gets larger pieces stored in it until they go to the docks for shipping out of state."

"I suggest we check that warehouse out." Leatherhead said. "That would be quickest way for the demons to invade New York before any authorities could try to respond."

"Not that it would do them much good." Casey added.

They made their way to the larger warehouse April shivered a bit. "I think we found the right place." She informed her friends.

"Yes, I sense something in the air too, something….malevolent." Rockwell agreed.

"Do you sense it Jennifer?" Raph asked his girlfriend.

Jennifer shook her head. "No." She admitted. "The only thing I can think of is that since I probably grew up around it without realizing what it was, I probably found myself getting used to it."

"That could make sense." Splinter agreed. "After a while any sense can become familiar, even though it may not be a good thing."

They had Pete do an aerial survey of the warehouse to see if there were any guards or traps or even cameras that could cause a problem. After a few minutes the mutant pigeon returned. "No guards, no traps that I can see, and the cameras seem to be inactive already." He reported.

"How reliable is that observation?" Leo had to wonder. The last thing they needed was to be seen on footage by any security personnel that would review the tapes at a later date. He already knew that Fulcanelli knew they were coming or already here and it wouldn't matter what they did there.

"I think it's pretty reliable." Donnie said as he lowered a small pair of binoculars. "The camera I see from here looks inactive too."

"Then let's move in." Leo decided as the team jumped off the rooftop and headed toward the warehouse. Every step brought more tension surging throughout each of their bodies now, each sensing some sort of evil within.

Instead of nearly kicking down the door as they, especially Raph or Mikey, would be inclined to Candy instead stopped her new friends and slipped a hairpin from the small pack on her waist. After only a minute or so she had the lock picked. Each of them gave her a thumbs up, though some wondered how she had come about that skill. Then they snuck inside.

"It's too quiet." Leo whispered.

"A little too quiet." Mikey added.

"It's creepy." April said softly.

"A lot too creepy." Aaliyah said half teasingly.

"What is that smell?" Pete asked, perhaps a bit too loudly. "And is it me or is it really hot in here, my feathers are molting."

"That smell is sulfur." Leatherhead answered in a whisper, but with his gravelly and growly voice it was almost impossible to pull that one off.

"It's not heat." Aaliyah added softly. "It's humidity, I felt this when I was competing in Florida and Arizona."

"it's one hell of a humidity." Raph pointed out. "More than I would expect from any place on Earth."

"Because you won't find humidity like this on this wretched planet, at least anymore." They heard Fulcanelli say, though they couldn't be sure from where. "But you would find it in the old days, before man, when this world was ruled by demons, when this planet was there Hell."

"Come on out you coward." Slash demanded.

"In good time, freak." Fulcanelli commented. "First though, the stage needs to be set and the game needs to begin." They heard a clicking as if something were locking, or unlocking. Then the floor they were on started to move upwards, and the glass ceiling above them began to part.

"I didn't know this warehouse could do that." Donnie said to his companions.

"It couldn't originally." Fulcanelli responded from wherever he was holed up at. "When I acquired this warehouse it was one of the modifications I put into it."

"I never knew you had these sort of resources dad." Jennifer said snidely.

Fulcanelli laughed. "My dear daughter. If you had been everything I had hoped you would be, you would privy to almost all of my secrets by now." He stated but this his voice turned hard. "Instead you had to become some sensitive goody good and will have to suffer for it."

"Suffer more than I've already made her do so at any rate." They heard Hector's voice. Rather he was around the rising arena or on some speaker himself was unknown because of his chameleon shapeshifting power.

Raph didn't miss his girlfriend shudder in half fear and half revulsion. "Show your face already Chameleon, so I can beat you to the ground." He demanded.

"As my master says, all in good time." Hector replied. "Maybe I'll even throw you off the rooftop again."

"Over my dead body." Slash growled out.

"That might just happen." Fulcanelli reminded the black masked mutant turtle. "So I advise you watch your words."

They reached their final destination on the roof. It seemed to have some sort of glass over it, they could see the night sky but felt no breeze. At the far end stood a wall that currently had a sheet over it. A mysterious wind came from out of nowhere and the sheet flew off, landing to the ground. No one had seen that though as the watched what was revealed and everyone let out a gasp in shock.

It seemed to be a moderately small wall standing there on its own. The wall's surface was not blank though as it had painted on it a large gargoyle like head. It had horns on its pointing down similar to the small demon that had come to the lair to deliver the challenge but in the center was a small pink spot that seemed drilled into the wall. It seemed to them as if the pink spot was a brain.

"Is that Kraang?" Mikey tried to joke.

"Don't think so man." Casey answered none the less. "It's not speaking incorrect English."

"Or doing anything." Leo added. "What is this thing?"

"An image of my sponsor." Fulcanelli's voice answered. "And now, the games shall begin."

"What games?" Raph questioned. "It's an ugly looking wall with what might be a brain inside of it. We'll tear it down like it's nothing." He looked to Slash and Leatherhead and together the three mutants started toward the wall.

"Wait." Both Rockwell and Donnie tried to call out, knowing there had to be more to it than that. But they already got their response as their seemed to be what sounded like a loud popping noise.

The three mutants hesitated where they were. Splinter swore he saw a small cube shoot from somewhere from the wall. It landed right in front of the three mutants and from nowhere stood the large creature the Mutanimals had encountered at the Kraang base when Hector had lead the assault to steal mutagen.

"Wow." Raph exclaimed startled.

The thing roared and then moved one massive hand, slapping the three mutants out of the way. Slash splayed to the right while Leatherhead splayed to the left. Raph sprawled in the middle and Jennifer rushed to him.

Now two popping sounds were heard and on either side of the back room two skeletal looking demons with the shoulder launchers showed up. "This thing is creating demons." Casey realized. "Just great."

Aaliyah got it now. "If we don't stop that icon thing, this room; this city; and eventually this world will be overrun with these demons." She stated. "We just have to figure out how to stop this thing." She twirled her bunrei in her hands. "But first we need to get some elbow room so we can figure out how." With that she ran toward one of the skeletal demons while Leo headed toward the other.

"What if stop these things from spawning from those little cube things?" Mondo asked. "Like intercept them before they hit the ground or something."

"Something tells me that would be a bad idea." Candy noted. "If those things create demons from nowhere, what happens if they hit a person? Would it turn them into a demon or would it simply kill them?"

"Let's not find out." Mikey decided.

There were more popping sounds and two more demons appeared, though these ones had never been seen before. They were large and gorilla like. They seemed to have no weapons but they immediately began to charge at them.

"Then let us get to work." Splinter stated as he ran toward one of the gorilla like demons and jumped over its charge attack. He brought his cane around and tripped the demon up, then brought it down to cause it to dissipate.

Leo and Aaliyah easily used their sharp weapons to cut down the skeleton creatures. The big problem at the moment was the last gorilla demon and the big one.

"Are you okay?" Jennifer asked as she kneeled down next to her boyfriend.

"Thing hits hard." Raph answered. "But I'll be fine." He recovered his sais and stood up. "Leatherhead, Slash. Go at it again." He said to the larger Mutanimals. "I'll keep it distracted."

"Didn't you learn anything dude?" Casey questioned him as two more popping sounds resulted in the imp like creatures the turtles had first faced when Fulcanelli arrived.

Mikey jumped up and landed on one of the imp demons and then used his nunchuck to up the head, causing it to dissipate. "That is just bizarre dudes." The orange masked turtle stated.

"Can it dork." Raph snapped as he threw some shurikens at the big demon. It thunked into its chest and the demon growled in annoyance at him and started toward him. That was when Slash came in and slammed his mace into the demon's head. It stunned him but did not kill him, but Leatherhead lifted it up and slammed it to the ground. Both large mutants then stomped on to make it dissipate.

"That's all fine and good." Rockwell noted as he used his psychic powers to send the demon gorilla creature flying into one of walls, making it dissipate on impact. "But we really do need to figure out how to stop that thing before we become too exhausted from fighting these things."

"That is in fact a good point." They heard Fulcanelli say from wherever he was hiding. "And I do despise the fact this is going rather slow. Allow me to speed this up." From out of nowhere a dozen of the imp things appeared, and they immediately rose up on their feet to each launch a fireball.

"Sewer apples." Raph muttered as he scooped Jennifer up into his arms and dodged two fireballs aimed at them. The rest of the team dodged fireballs except for Rockwell who took one that was more or less intentionally aimed at him with his psychic powers and tossed it right back at the imp creature, causing it to dissipate.

To make matters worse another popping sound resounded and it resulted in another skeleton demon and another of the minotaur looking ones.

"We need a plan like now." Candy noted. "This just became heavy."

Aaliyah used her bunrei to cut through one of the imps and then turned to look at her team. "She's right." The female turtle agreed. "But how do we reach that point?"

April glanced around and then looked again at the demon head on the wall that seemed to be responsible, except for the little hole on the top where the brain like object resided. "We don't reach it." She realized. "At least not conventionally."

"What does that mean Red?" Casey asked her.

"Do you have plan?" Donnie asked her.

"I think so." April replied.

"Well whatever it we better hurry up with it." Raph said and as if to emphasize his point two more popping sounds resounded and this time one of the medium sized spider demon's appeared with one of the bigger pale skinned ones with fire ball cannons on either arm.

"You will never win this confrontation and there is no escape." Fulcanelli said with mocking laughter. "This is over, daughter. You and your merry little band of freaks are done."

Is Fulcanelli's plan foolproof? Is April's plan going to work? Even if they defeat the Icon is there any chance that the fight will be over?


	23. The War Is On part 2

Raph: TMNT is Nickelodeon's, as is anything you see on the show. Everything else doesn't belong to them. Movin' on.

Each of the group knew what the plan was. It was a bit of a challenge for each of them to do what needed to be done even if it was something that seemed relatively activity free. Except for Casey, Mondo, April, and Jennifer the rest of the group each took one of the sides.

The Mutanimals and Splinter took the left side, which is where the minotaur like demon had appeared. Splinter had already decided to distract it while their heavy hitters, the mutant gator Leatherhead and the large black masked turtle Slash would take out this one as they had the first one to appear in this 'arena'.

That left the mutant pigeon Pete, the psychic mutant monkey and former scientist Professor Tyler Rockwell, and the admittedly inexperienced mutant female Axolotl Candy to try to fend off the remaining demons, mostly the imp demon's but also the gorilla like demon.

On the other side was the five mutant turtles, four of them brothers and the other being the girl who had been mutated with Candy. Aaliyah was wearing the white mask she had started with and the rest of the pads and wrappings she had recently adopted when she officially became a member of the good guys, and to her it really did feel right.

The blue masked turtle Leonardo went after the skeletal shoulder cannon mounted demon, his second since this fight had broken out, he knew that his twin katana could make short work of it. The orange masked Michelangelo hung back, twirling his nunchuck a little, but that was because he and Aaliyah already knew how they were going to take the bulky demon out. That left the red masked turtle Raphael to go after some of the imps with his twin sais and the purple masked turtle Donatello to go after the small spider demon with his bo staff, though he chose to extend the blade inside to turn it into the naginata.

Ultimately their objective was simple. Keep the demon spawn out of the small middle that was closed off from the fight. April O'Neil and Jennifer Quinn hung back, even going so far as sitting down cross legged and seemed to be watching. The two girls never the less held hands, the blonde's right hand clasped on the red head's left hand.

Casey Jones, vigilante of awesomeness as he liked to think of himself, extended the blades on his sneakers so he had his roller blades ready to go. He dropped a hockey puck on the ground, a cherry bomb taped to the middle. It had been lit and the fuse was starting to burn down, though it was still a couple minutes off. He then skated back toward where the girls were sitting and on his way he passed Mondo Gecko, who was positioned on his skateboard and ready to go.

Two popping sounds resounded. The first released another gorilla looking demon that started to charge toward the remaining Mutanimals. The second produced another of the minotaur looking demons, and this one was right in the middle again, this time not too far from the hockey puck.

"Not good." Casey said. "We gotta to something."

Leo had used his katana to make short work of the skeletal demon, taking off an arm and a leg, and as it stumbled back he took off its head, making it dissolve into nothing. He heard Casey and turned to see the demon. He made a running start, jumped up and delivered a staggering snap jump kick to the things head as he called out, "Slash!"

The black masked turtle turned around and saw it. Despite his size he was able to jump up and behind it, then raised his large mace and hit the demon like it was a baseball bat just as Leatherhead took the other one by the arm and threw it. The two demons slammed into each other and though it did not kill them it stunned them for a moment.

Aaliyah leapt up, bringing her foot down hard on the huge demon, then flipped onto its back and more specifically the tank strapped to it. Mikey changed his nunchuck into the kusarigama chain and again began to twirl it around as Aaliyah drove both points of her bunrei weapons into the tank. He threw the chain and it wrapped around her waist. The youngest turtle brother pulled her out of harm's way just as the tank ruptured and the explosion enveloped the huge demon.

The female turtle landed beside Mikey. "Nice timing." She said with a smile.

Mikey nodded. "Like a turtle do." He replied with a smile of his own.

"We better do this before something else pops up there." Mondo voiced, balancing on his skateboard and taking a moment to run his tongue over his eyes as unblinking lizards do.

"He's right." Slash agreed as he came in from behind the giant minotaur demon and smashed his mace against where he figured the spine would be, causing that demon to dissipate. Leatherhead used his hands to bend the other one back hard enough for a loud snapping like the spine breaking and then it dissolved as well.

"Where do they get these things anyway?" Candy asked. "Is there like an assembly line of these things or do they only have like a few of them that get resurrected or something?"

"Well if you want to believe Hector those skeletal things basically come off something like an assembly line." Donnie answered.

"This speculation can wait." Splinter reminded them all. "We must deal with the situation at hand." As if to prove the point he now started to engage another of the imp demons in combat himself, proving clearly superior to his opponent.

"You girls ready?" Casey asked as he looked to the red head and the blonde. Though it would seem like they were doing nothing they were in fact basically the lynch pin to this entire plan. Both girls nodded in confirmation.

Mikey shouted out his trademark, "Booyakasha!" as he jumped out and shot out his kusarigama chain to smack several imps backwards. Raph and Donnie jumped over them as they sailed past and even came down hard on two of them.

Casey skated toward Mondo Gecko, unarmed, as the lizard mutant started to skate toward the vigilante.

"What are they trying to do?" They heard Hector question from wherever he was watching this event.

Casey and Mondo grasped each other's hands and started to twirl around. This caused Hector burst out laughing. "What is this, ballet?" He questioned. "Even the blonde wasn't lame enough to try to do that."

April saw Jennifer frown a little. She had the thought her friend might have actually tried it if her life had been more stable than it was with a demon worshipping father and an obsessed and abusive second in command.

As they twirled Mondo suddenly released as he yelled, "Cowabunga!" Casey went faster than if he had just made the move alone due to the momentum. As Casey approached the hockey puck he took out his trusty hockey stick and gave a resounding slap shot and an equally resounding, "Goongala!" that sent the puck flying.

"The odds of that shot actually getting to what I suspect is the intended target is pathetically small." Fulcanelli gloated with amusement. "You all must be getting desperate."

"Says you." Raph replied. All that really remained to be seen was if April and Jennifer could really pull off the red head's plan.

This was where the hard part came in. Both girls focused their efforts, imaging taking control of the hockey pucks trajectory from wherever it might have gone to psychically forcing it to head toward the very opening where the brain like object was supposed to be residing, the theory being that destroying that would end this game and this part of the demon threat.

The gamble came with how much control Fulcanelli really had over that. He was aware on some level that his daughter had psychic powers as it was his experiments that had given her those powers, and to what end was still a mystery to them all, even her. Whether or not the healing powers she had exhibited were also planned or not wasn't currently known.

If Hector had noticed and if Hector had chosen to let his boss know it, then he would also know that April had psychic powers of her own as a result of the Kraang's experiments on her family line over the last couple of generations that proceeded her.

What everyone was sure they could not know was the extent over the last few weeks that their teacher Splinter had spent focusing their concentration and honing their psychic powers, both on an individual level and also on a collective level since that was they needed to overpower the mind control worm inside of his daughter Karai's mind in order to free her from Shredder's thrall. That had been the prime plan for a while now before Aaliyah and Candy had defected from Fulcanelli's side and the female turtle had subsequently altered their plans for the better when she decided she should help free Karai of the evil that possessed her as well.

Almost as if understanding what the plan might have been, some of the imps turned to rally against the girls but were quickly blocked out by Raphael, Donatello, Casey, Mondo, Aaliyah and Splinter. Leonardo, Michelangelo, Rockwell, Candy, Slash, Leatherhead, and Pigeon Pete did their best to try to keep the other demons, especially the bigger ones, at a distance.

At first the puck seemed to spin out of anyone's control as it flew toward the wall, far faster than either of the girls had figured, and it seemed clear that the puck would miss the intended target. Then all of a sudden it seemed to stop as if some invisible force had grabbed it, then it rose higher into the air then shot out again, this time arcing in a way that the puck shot straight through into the small hole where the brain like object seemed to reside.

"Home run!" Candy exclaimed happily.

Casey looked over at her. "You don't know a thing about sports, huh?" He asked the axolotl girl.

She managed to look both completely embarrassed and a little angry at the question. "I think there's more important things to worry about than that." She responded. Now was not the time to reveal to anyone that her life had never been very conducive for sports.

"It's a touchdown." Mondo commented now.

"Really?" Casey questioned, feeling like he was about to explode.

Mondo Gecko laughed at the expression on his vigilante friend's face. "I'm so joshing you dude, that was totally a goal." The gecko mutant revealed as he got off of his skateboard.

"Home run, touchdown, goal." Raph said with a rolling of his sai clenched fist. "Who cares? What I want to know right now is why isn't anything happening?"

At that they did notice one problem. There was no explosion. The demon's weren't dying or dissipating or even trying to worry about the fact their existence could have been cut short. They pressed on in their attacks.

"Were we wrong?" Leo asked, though no one had enough knowledge to say one way or another.

"Did something happen to the cherry bomb?" Aaliyah asked as she took out an approaching imp. "Or was it defective in some way?"

At that point there was an explosion and there was the sound of a bizarre low voiced but high pitched roaring, as if something in the wall had felt pain. Donnie was almost sure the demons around them had flinched but they quickly moved on to try to finish the team off.

"Why didn't that work?" Mikey asked worriedly.

"Well it was just a hockey puck with a cherry bomb ductaped to it." Rockwell reminded them all. "It might not have been strong enough to do the job in one hit." He used his psychic powers to reflect a fireball into the imp that shot it in the first place.

"You girls up for a second round?" Casey asked.

"We're ready." April promised. "But now Fulcanelli knows what we're trying to do. If he can he'll make it harder."

Slash nodded and looked at Pete. "We got things at ground level. You're our eyes in the sky, if he tried anything from there it's up to you to take care of it." He ordered.

Pete gave a sloppy but full hearted salute and answered with a crisp, "Sir, yes sir."

"Michelangelo." Splinter called out. "Use your kusarigama to back Pete up."

Mikey nodded. "Will do sensei." He acknowledged.

Mondo got on his skateboard and took his position again while Casey lit and dropped another cherry bomb taped up puck. This time Mikey got in front of it to protect it until Casey was heading right toward it to hit it again. Then Casey bladed his way back to where the girls were.

"It seems like the demon's struggles to come stop us are more intense this time." Aaliyah noted as the imps gave up any attempt to launch fireballs and stepped up more toward slashing their claws at their opponents. As if to further prove that point two more popping sounds resounded but it only resulted in two more skeletal demons that were easy enough for Leo and Aaliyah to take apart, quite literally.

Casey again started toward Mondo. "Let's make it count this time." He said, though it was hard to know if he was talking to the gecko mutant, to the others, to himself, or even just to say something.

Mondo and Casey again took hands to twirl around, increasing the momentum of the strike. When Mondo released him he took out his hockey puck again and tried to yell, "Goongala!" even louder than before though no one could really say if that had been accomplished or not. Then he hit the puck again and sent it flying.

Having already just done so, April and Jennifer had a much easier time of taking over momentum for the puck and tossing it into the hole in the top of the seeming wall.

Everyone seemed to be holding their breaths this time as they waited for any sort of reaction from whatever force seemed to possess the wall the brain object was behind.

Sure enough after another moment there was an explosion again followed by the weird loud but low scream and then there seemed to be a series of explosions, though no one could really identify where it was coming from since it was basically a wall. It also didn't seem to be any sort of explosion that could have been caused by any sort of munitions anyone knew about.

The explosion did send everyone into a tailspin for a moment. The problem with where the girls were was that they were closest to the rooftop's edge. Jennifer had the dubious fortune of falling on her stomach, her chin hitting the concrete a bit painfully but not too worse for the wear. She looked around in just enough time to see April start to take a topple off the roof though. "April!" She screamed.

Donnie recovered very quickly, retracting the blade in his staff and then leaned it over yelling, "Grab the staff." To his red headed crush as he extended it over the edge, the distance too far for anyone else to grab her.

He felt a weight on his staff as April grabbed it with a, "I got it Donnie." The purple masked turtle proceeded to pull her up, ending up wrapping one arm gently but firmly around her waist and boosting her up so she was sitting on the rooftop looking straight at him.

"Are you okay?" he asked her.

April nodded. "I'm fine. Thank you." She said softly. Then she leaned over and kissed him very softly on the lips, but held the kiss softly on his lips and after a moment Donnie found himself gently returning the kiss.

Perhaps even more importantly, at least to everyone but the two kissing teens, they saw each of the demons react as if they had been defeated as they let out their death knells and then dissipated into nothing. When all seemed to be silent the wall object crumbled into dust and then seemed to fade away as well.

"Impossible." Hector growled. "No way they could have won."

"It seems as if they did." Fulcanelli mused though the tone of his voice indicated he was no happier with their victory. He privately mused that perhaps he had done too good of a job engineering his daughter's genes and wondered what else she had uncovered.

"You've lost father." Jennifer said as she rose to her feet.

"Lost?" Fulcanelli echoed. "Hardly." With that he appeared with Hector and Gregory on either side of him. "This fight still has some life left in it."

"Dude, your totally outnumbered." Mondo Gecko taunted. "It's like five to one odds."

"Quick judge aren't you lizard?" Hector questioned.

"I'm a gecko." Mondo responded.

"You assumed one of the factions was done when you took out Yen, and another was taken out when Chein Khan failed in his bid to summon his demon lord." Fulcanelli said. "You were wrong."

That half heard comment got Donnie to break the kiss from his red headed crush. "Come again?" Donnie asked as April landed gently to his right now. "And how do you know about that last one anyway?"

"My partners told me exactly what happened with the failed attempt to bring Noi Tai Dar into this world. He's no longer in the underworld but I assume by the fact this city is still standing that you found a way to defeat him." Fulcanelli answered smugly. "As for Yen…" He looked to his shape shifter mutant.

"I was there." Hector revealed with a grin. "I saw Chein Khan end his brother and I saw what you did to destroy his lair and send Chein Khan packing. You left the place a mess, most of those interesting little trinkets he had acquired destroyed. Except this." Hector pulled the medallion from under his shirt.

"So a necklace survived, big whoop." Raph responded. "You haven't impressed me yet Chameleon. All you did was prove how much of a sneak you are."

"Grave robber also come to mind." Candy added with a smirk.

"Do not be so hasty." Splinter was the one who advised them. "If I am not mistaken, that is more than a medallion. That is the source for summoning the Dark Oni that Yen used to control."

"Uh oh." Pigeon Pete commented.

"Yes." Hector laughed. "It was what Yen used…what I will use to summon Dark Oni and overwhelm you all."

"Don't count your chickens before they're hatched." Mocked a voice from another edge. They turned to see Chein Khan standing there again, with his seemingly endless army of white ninja and Goldens, though they all noted that there were more of the former than the latter.

"A little short on Golden's." Mikey noted mockingly. "Did word get around about who you intended to sacrifice for you black demon buddy?"

"Quiet, cur." Chein Khan snapped. "This war isn't over. I have this victory in hand.

"Don't get confident dog." Hector interjected as he summoned over a hundred Dark Oni, more than the turtle team had ever seen prior too. If the Oni gave any notice about their sudden change in leadership they didn't show it.

"Those are indeed wise words, mutant." They heard from yet another corner. They turned to see Shredder there now, with almost an equal number of Footbots, along with each of his minions. Tiger Claw, Rahzar, Rocksteady, Bebop, Stockman, Fishface and Karai. Hun was also with them, one could only assume to represent the Purple Dragon's stake in all of this though he had come without Sid, Fong, and Tsoi.

"Miwa." Splinter whispered softly.

"Um, I think this is bad dudes." Mikey noted. "We're on a big rooftop and we're the smallest team here."

Leo raised his katana blades. "Get ready guys, this it. Either we walk away or they do."

Out in what one could call the edge of time, but it really wasn't that exactly, Renet was stuck dusting the chamber room where several of the artifacts Lord Simultaneous had kept around. Normally she hated to dust, after all she didn't become an apprentice time mistress to be dusting things. Right now however she was just a bit distracted after her encounter with the hero turtles of legend and their allies.

What distracted her the most was her thoughts kept drifting to Mikey. She had teased Mikey about age differences when they had gotten on the horse to pursue Savanti Romero and he had asked her if that was their first date. She couldn't help but remember she had kind of revealed her own thoughts when she had called him the cute one when she first met them.

"I guess that means Mikey thinks I'm cute too then." Renet said to herself, giggling a bit. That made her think of a really old song she had heard once called "Like a Girl in Love". She was wondering if she should try to track that song down again now that she thought she might have an idea of what that was like now.

It made her think of Mikey again and she wandered over to the time globe they had in a corner and she whispered, "Show me Michelangelo." The time globe did so, showing him along with quite a few of his friends as well as his brother and master. "I knew I had gone back just a bit too early." She murmured to herself as she saw Aaliyah and Candy with them now as well.

Then the time globe pulled back its view after a moment and Renet's eyes widened in horror. "Oh, no." She gasped. "That's going on already. That shouldn't be happening yet, if I remember right this is happening too soon." None the less there it was, the turtle team surrounded on three sides by the Foot Clan, the Golden's and Fulcanelli the Dark Oni. The odds didn't look good for them. "I wish I could help them." She whispered. She glanced around a bit and then noticed the other object currently there on display. "Do I dare?" She asked herself as she looked again at the scene on the globe, where all three evil groups seemed to be approaching the turtle team, who had their weapons or fists valiantly but perhaps futilely raised for combat.

This is it, the final part of the gang war is about to begin. Can the Turtles beat these overwhelming odds? Is this do or die time when it comes to freeing Karai? Is this rock bottom for the team or is there a way for things to go down even higher? What will become of each side? Soon enough all will be revealed!


	24. The War Is On part 3

Leonardo: Remember that Myra doesn't own TMNT or anything associated with the show, if you don't see on the show it's a different matter.

"I think we're a bit outnumbered here." Mikey said as he twirled his nunchucks and looked about at their situation.

"No kidding." Mondo agreed.

On the left side was Chein Khan, leader of the Golden's with his army of white ninja and what remained of the other Golden's. In the middle was Jennifer's own father Fulcanelli being flanked on either side by his lieutenant's: the mutant shifter Hector and the human Gregory and the mutant's new army the Dark Oni, formerly belonging to the mysterious sorcerer Yen. And on the left was their oldest nemesis, Shredder and the Foot Clan, with all of his mutant army as well as Splinter's stolen daughter who he had named Karai. Hun was also there, seemingly out of place but he was leader of the Purple Dragons and they were basically aligned with the Foot and all.

And they all seemed very intent on eliminating the turtle team first.

"Attack, my Goldens!" Chein Khan exclaimed. To everyone's surprise though a great deal of the white ninja's started over to attack the Dark Oni, though some of the Golden's themselves started over toward the heroes.

"What is this?" Gregory demanded. "We need to be focusing on the freaks first."

"I don't recall inviting you to a strategy session." Chein Khan snapped at the man. "You're mutant friend has something that belonged to my brother and I won't allow any remnant of his to survive." He declared.

Fulcanelli laughed. "He is dead and you still to cling to such thoughts." He stated. "That is why you shall lose."

"Who sent goons after his daughter?" He heard Raphael question hotly. "Who has a jerk for a goon so obsessed with possessing her that he turned himself into a shifting freak to try to get to her?"

"And trying to kill the one man she's ever been in love with." Jennifer added, even as a blush rose in her cheeks at having to make the admission in front of so many that she didn't trust. She thought though for whatever it was worth her father needed to hear it. He didn't seem moved by his daughter's admission of love however.

"I suppose we all have our own reasons for this war." Fulcanelli stated, sounding reasonable. Then the sorcerer turned to some of the approaching white ninja, raising his arm. From it came what seemed to be a stream of fire, though it was actually darker than anything; the night surrounding their arena of confrontation, the Dark Oni that started to engage the approaching white ninja, even the black of the Foot bots that the Shredder had brought with him. The fire enveloped the white ninja before leaving nothing behind, not even the ash that should normally be left with fire.

"What the hell was that?" Mondo asked, sounding a bit freaked out.

"La Brulure Noire." Splinter answered for the young man. "The black fire, just as Leonardo described it to me the night he first came into town and encountered my sons."

"I thought that was just a rumor." Tiger Claw mused. "To think such dark magic exists in real life…"

"He must not be allowed to use that again." Shredder declared. To say he was frightened of the power would be a huge overestimation, but he knew he didn't want to see that again, at least not unleashed on him, his daughter, or even to be fair his minions. It would be such a chore to replace them. "Footbots, attack."

The team was somewhat gratified by the fact they didn't have to deal with any of the minions now as they seemed perfectly content; as a group of robots, a group of seemingly mindless demons and group of seemingly mindless ghost like entities, to fight for their respective masters.

Aaliyah looked at her two human friends. "It's time." She declared. "We need to bring Karai home." The two nodded back at her in agreement.

"Be careful, April." Donnie said to her the red headed girl who had just kissed him minutes earlier. He wasn't really sure what to make of that move and knew they would have to find the nerve to talk about it later.

April looked over at him and gave him a soft smile. "You two." She replied. The purple masked turtle couldn't be sure, but were her eyes softer? Was her gaze more gentle this time? He shook those thoughts away, again now was not the time.

"We meet again, Hamato Yoshi." Shredder stated as he began walking toward his former friend. "It was inevitable after all. And this time I will end your miserable existence." The blades extended from his gauntlets.

Splinter took a fighting stance now. "We shall see whose last night this will truly be Oroku Saki." The rat master declared.

For some reason that Leo wasn't entirely sure of since Chein Khan had recently threatened to destroy Hector and the medallion that held control over the Dark Oni, the blue masked turtle found the pit bull mutant bearing down on him with his sword raised. Leo raised his katana and the two blades met with a loud clang that in other circumstances might have drawn attention.

"I thought you would be going after the one with your brother's medallion." Leo said.

Chein Khan laughed. "I will in time. After all of you are gone. You ruined my plans to bring my demon master into this world and you shall pay for that." He stated as he swung his sword at Leo again. The blue masked turtle blocked the attack.

"You do realize that that demon would have ended the world." Leo countered as he tried to go on the attack against him. Chein Khan responded with his own blocks.

"Of course I do." Chein Khan answered and said nothing more. He started to wonder, for whatever it might be worth, if the mutant dog really did want to destroy the world or if he had gotten himself into a devil's bargain from which there had been no escape…except of course for the fact that the turtle team had given him that out when they banished him in between dimensions and yet here was seeking revenge.

The mutant dog was right about one thing. Hector pushed his way through Golden's and Dark Oni alike as he sought out Raphael, the one who he viewed as having stolen Jennifer from him. The fact that in her heart and soul she never would have been his didn't seem to be grasped at all. The red masked turtle though was just as eager to confront him, in the hopes that he could rid Jennifer of one of the things in her life that had caused her so much pain and suffering.

"You really want this Chameleon?" Raph questioned as he twirled his sais in his hand. He was never quite sure when he or his two brothers had started calling them by the mutant names Mikey had given then but decided it didn't really matter.

"I'm ready to end this, turtle." Hector spat. "Ready to end you." He formed mantis like scythes on his hand and charged at the red masked turtle, intending to bring them down on his shoulders, hopefully taking off his arms.

Raphael jumped out of the way and then leapt forward, kicking Hector in the face and sent him stumbling backward. "You really are pathetic." Raph said. "All this for nothing."

"Not for nothing." Hector responded as he rose. "You stole Jennifer from me."

"She was never yours!" Raph snapped back as he stepped in to strike the shifter in the chest. Splinter's ears were strong enough to have picked this exchange up and he reflected somewhat ironically that that was practically the same conversation Splinter had had with Shredder almost two years ago when the Kraang first invaded Earth with the Technodrome and he had set out to rescue April, unaware his nemesis had given her to the Kraang already.

Donnie found himself in the slightly awkward position of battling Rahzar. The purple masked turtle found himself blocking claw attacks with his bo staff, but he had to reflect as he looked around at the other battles this one wasn't quite as…personal as some of the others were.

Speaking of personal Casey found Hun coming toward him. "I think it's time to settle the score hockey boy." Hun declared and then he ran forward and aimed a kick at the vigilante's face.

Casey skated under him and then came up with a bat at the ready. "Any time you're ready, Bruce Lee." He mocked and then swung the baseball at his head. Hun blocked it and Casey used that opportunity to bring his rollered feet up into his chin hard.

"This ends tonight Slash, at least if I have it my way." Tiger Claw declared as he drew a blade of his own and prepared to face off against the black masked turtle.

"On that we can agree on." Slash stated as he withdrew his mace and tried to slam it into Tiger Claw. The mutant cat used his jet pack to evade the attack but when he tried to bring the blade down on his head Slash used his mace to block it and the stepped back before trying another swing that was jet packed dodged again.

That left the other rather large member of the Mutanimals to take on the largest member of the Foot Clan, as Rocksteady aimed his horn straight for Leatherhead. The mutant alligator caught the mutant rhino by the horn and lifted him up, then over as he slammed him into the ground.

Rocksteady recovered quickly. "Well done." He admitted in his strong Russian accent as he withdrew his gold hammer. "Now let's try this again." He swung and it hit Leatherhead in the face hard, though it didn't seem to do much more than anger him. With a roar he snapped at the mutant rhino but he took a quick step back to avoid it.

"Let's see if you can catch what you can't see." Bebop stated as he disappeared from Rockwell's immediate vision. Then he started to fire his hip lasers at Rockwell, though he was able to dodge it easily enough. "That's right monkey boy, can't touch this." He sing songed and then started to go into the chorus for that song.

Rockwell used his psychic powers to levitate up a chunk of a Footbot and then tossed it where he was pretty sure that the mutant warthog had to be standing. He heard a thunk as metal hit flesh. "What the?" Bebop questioned as he turned around. "Who did that?"

"It's not hard to hit an invisible object that can't keep his mouth shut young man." Rockwell lectured him. "As for who did it, I think I'll let you figure that out, pig boy."

Pigeon Pete and Stockman-Fly pretty much had each other distracted and some of them would say that their fight might be the most ineffectual, basically being dodging in flight with occasional pecks or slaps.

"Well, looks like it's you and me Jason." Fishface stated as he withdrew his own weapons. "It's time for some gecko fillet."

"I told you it's Mondo Gecko now, Fishface." He retorted. "And the only fillet here will be eau de carp."

Fishface moved in fast and clocked Mondo hard in the face. The mutant gecko fell to the ground in a hard thump. Before the fish mutant could capitalize on it he heard, "Don't count your eggs before they hatch, fish man." When he turned he got slapped in the face hard by a tail and then sent flying with kick to the stomach.

"Are you okay?" Candy asked as she knelt down to check on him.

Mondo nodded a bit. "Feel like a speaker went off in my ears, but I'll live." He shook his head a bit. "Where'd you learn moves like that?"

The axolotl girl shrugged a bit. "I may not know how to beat demons and magic that well, but handling street thugs is something I know more about than I ever would have liked too." She answered.

"Thanks for the save." Mondo said as he stood up and recovered his skateboard.

"Now we're even from being the demon frying session." Candy replied with a smile, referring to his saving her when one of Fulcanelli's Hell Hunters had been using electricity from a nearby facility to keep itself healthy and invulnerable. "Now let's show tuna man over there what we can do."

"Maybe we can talk about this?" Mikey suggested to Gregory as what seemed now to be the only human member of Fulcanelli's syndicate, and certainly the only one present, approached the orange masked turtle.

"I don't think there's anything to talk about." Gregory said to him as he cracked his knuckles together. "You don't scare me."

Mikey shrugged. "Wasn't worried about scaring you, dude." The orange masked turtle noted. "I mean, you can handle ugly. Look at the ones you choose to hang out with." He gestured offhandedly to Fulcanelli and especially Hector. "I just thought I'd spare you a beat down if I could."

Gregory laughed. "We'll see who gets the beat down reptile." He replied. He swung a fist a Mikey and he ducked under it, wrapping a nunchuck around his wrist and then flipping him onto his back. Mikey then tried to bring his weapon down on his face but the man dodged it.

Gregory now did something Mikey honestly hadn't expected considering he was surrounded by ninjas, mutants, and demon summoners. The man pulled a gun out on the orange masked turtle ."Time to die." He stated and shot at Mikey.

"Yikes!" Mikey gasped and barely dodged the bullet. Even though the turtles didn't encounter guns too often their Master Splinter had still taught his son's some ways to deal with them. Most involved stopping a gun man from successfully pulling the gun, or to prevent it from going off in the first place. With both of those options past, he could only think of one thing.

He took out a few shurikens and threw them at Gregory. Before the man could respond one of them stuck into the gun and cut through a small portion of it, enough that the gun was now unable to be fired as it went through some of the firing chamber.

"Nice shot." Gregory grudgingly admitted to the orange masked turtle. Then he took out another weapon, this one a wicked looking bowie knife, and lunged at him.

"You're just full of surprises." Mikey commented as he dodged the attack and then kicked the knife out of his hands. "Normally I love surprises dude but yours are the kind that I bet most people could live without."

Gregory tried to attack him with fists flying now, and Mikey did a two backflips past him and then turned around, turning his nunchuck into the kusarigama and then used it to wrap his arms up around his body and then with a "Booyakasha!" he kicked Gregory hard and he lost consciousness as he hit the debris left from the wall that had housed whatever summoned the demons during the initial fight.

"Well done reptile." Fulcanelli said mockingly as he walked now toward the orange masked turtle.

Splinter had done well keeping the Shredder at bay, neither master gaining much advantage over the other. But when the rat master saw his youngest son being approached by the one man in all of existence to effortlessly wield the black burn, he lost his focus. "My son, be very careful." Splinter called out just before Shredder gave him a savage kick in the face and sent the rat flying.

Donnie noticed as well. "Mikey!" He gasped, having seen twice what the black burn could do to an opponent. Rahzar took advantage of that and grabbed the purple masked turtle by the arm and bashing him into the ground.

Leo noticed as well but Chein Khan had not let up once and all the eldest turtle could do was hope that his youngest brother was more skilled than he ever let onto his siblings or master.

Raph too noticed. "Damn it." The red masked turtle cursed and he tried to abandon his fight against Hector but the shifting mutant locked one of the scythe along the turtle's belt and tossed him backwards.

"You have your own problems to worry about reptile." Hector taunted him. "He's on his own."

Mikey twirled his nunchuck around. "Alright then, sorcerer dude." He decided. "Let's get this party started." He then ran forward and swung his nunchuck around to hit the sorcerer in the face but he caught the weapon and slammed Mikey to the ground hard, then followed up with a hard toss that knocked the wind out of him.

"And now for the first decisive blow in this fight." Fulcanelli proclaimed. "Everyone watch as La Brulure Noire takes its first real fighter in this war." And with that he released the black burn straight at Mikey.

"My son." Splinter gasped as he tried to move past the Shredder to do whatever he could to help his son, even if it meant taking the hit for him. Shredder reached out and caught Splinter by the back of the head and slammed him hard into the roof.

"No." Leo gasped and then tried to jump past Chein Khan to try to aid his brother, but the bull dog mutant caught the blue masked turtle by the ankle and made him land hard on the ground. Too make it worse two Golden's were now in front of the recovering turtle as Chein Khan came from behind.

"Mikey!" Donnie exclaimed and he too tried to go to his brother but was smacked hard by Rahzar.

"Finally, the freak is going to be wiped out." Rahzar said with a laugh. Part of him had never forgiven Mikey for causing him so much trouble, both when they first met and the orange masked turtle had really thought they could be friends and even when he had chased Mikey above a vat of mutagen and he had become double mutated into the wolf dog mutant he was today.

"NO!" Raph yelled and tried to go to his brother as well.

Hector intervened by shifting into a bull like face and slammed hard into Raph, one of his horn's leaving a gash on the red masked turtle's right side. "Keep losing focus and you'll end up just like you did the first time at the stadium, or worse." He said gleefully.

The black burn flew closer to Mikey, and then a cry of "No!" pierced the night now from another feminine voice. Then Renet was in front of Mikey with her fists raised and the rings on her fingers glowing as they had when she had punched Savanti Romero. Then to everyone's surprise, regardless of which side of the moral compass they stood on, the apprentice time mistress shot her fists out and intercepted the black burn…and the black burn fizzled out.

"What?" Fulcanelli gasped. For the first time in a long time, far longer than even his own daughter could ever realize, he felt something. He refused to name it but it was doubt and even some fear that forces out there beyond his control would not let him win.

"How did you do that Renet?" Mikey asked as he started to groggily stand up.

"The black burn isn't entirely unstoppable." She told him as she now helped him to stand. "And being what I am, I know how to stop it from killing." Renet explained and then looked to Mikey. "I had to stop it from killing you." She now added in a gentler voice.

"Foolish girl, you're only delaying the inevitable." Fulcanelli declared, all traces of uncertainty that had been briefly felt being forced to the back and buried.

"No." Renet said as she shook her head. "This can't be allowed to happen." She picked up the time scepter, the same object she had stolen from its resting place when she decided to risk Lord Simultaneous's wrath when she chose to come back in time to help the turtle team, which she had dropped on the ground in order to rescue Mikey and looked to him. "This has to end." She raised the time scepter and just as she had twice in their fight against Savanti Romero sent the sorcerer through a time door that promptly closed behind him.

"Where'd he go?" Mikey asked.

"Um…." Renet hesitated a bit. She seemed more like herself now that the immediate danger to her and Mikey had slipped away. "I…don't really know. But I'm like ninety five percent sure he's not going to pose a threat anymore."

Mikey's older brothers and his father were now able to focus fully on their fights now that he was safe. Mikey smiled at her and hugged her. "Thank you, thank you." He stated. "I so did want to become a Kentucky fried turtle."

Renet didn't realize she was blushing over the contact, in part because she didn't mind it at all. "Glad to help, Mikey." She said.

Mikey pulled away. "Speaking of help, we better go lend a hand. Let's start with Raph." He said.

Renet nodded. "Kay." She agreed.

"You just keep seeming to gather allies, rodent." Shredder spat. "It's their funeral."

"So much for your hopes their Rahzar." Donnie stated as he brought up his staff and slammed it hard into the skeletal dog mutants jaw.

"Let's try this again Chameleon." Raph said as he got up.

"Indeed." Hector said. "One on one, you're done."

"He's not alone there dude." Mikey said as he came up on his other side, along with Renet for whatever that might have been worth.

"One down, two to go." Chein Khan gloated. "With Fulcanelli goes his syndicate and his claim to this city."

"Then you're next." Leo decided. He lashed out and tripped both of the Goldens' before turning to face him. "Let's do it."

Suddenly a Kraang portal opened up. Two black arms stretched out. "OH CHEIN KHAN." They heard Noi Tai Dar from within as nothing else seemed to be coming out. The dog mutant dodged the attack. "I THINK IT IS TIME WE HAVE A LITTLE CHAT."

Leo grinned a bit at the startled reaction his adversary had. "You want him, you can have him." The blue masked turtle stated as he kicked Chein Khan in the chest hard. The dog mutant howled his protest even as the black arms grabbed him and then both appendages and mutant vanished through the Kraang portal before it closed.

With Chein Khan's abrupt departure the white ninja vanished and the few remaining Golden's noticed their lack of numbers and quickly chose to flee as well. Neither the Foot Clan nor the turtle team were too inclined to stop them. This also freed Leo up to go help his father against the Shredder.

Shredder laughed. "Looks like we're right where we should have always been." The armor clad ninja master declared. "The Foot Clan against the Hamato Clan."

"But we're not really part of the Hamato Clan." Candy noted.

"Don't kid yourself." Donnie said to her and then looked at all of their friends. "You're all a part of the family." That brought a smile of happiness all around.

"It is time then Shredder." Splinter stated. "Time to end this."

April: Um, didn't you forget about something?

Me: Nope, I think part of next chapter will be devoted toward your fight with Karai so you're reactions will be seen then.

April: (shrugs) Okay.

Will Karai be freed successfully? Will this be the end of any of the clans? Were you surprised to see Renet and what she did? Is that five percent chance of Fulcanelli coming back accurate? What could result from Noi Tai Dar's discussion with Chein Khan? The Gang War concludes next.


	25. The War Is On part 4

Leo: Remember that if it's on the show Myra doesn't own it. If you don't see it there it's another matter.

"We meet again princess." Karai said as she drew her tanto and looked toward the three approaching girls. She wasn't quite sure where the fifth turtle had come from but since it didn't seem to concern her father then it didn't concern her.

"Sorry Karai." The white masked turtle said to the kunoichi as she held her bunrei high. "If you want to get to April you have to go through me."

Karai shrugged. "Your demise, little turtle girl." She stated and attacked Aaliyah. She was able to easily block it and then back flip away from her.

The two girls had to be ready. They had to take a moment of course to gather their strength as having to use their powers once, never mind twice, to help defeat the demon producing wall ornament was not on their list when they had thought about freeing Karai. Luckily for the general plan neither was Aaliyah.

"I can't believe that worm is stronger than you." Aaliyah said to Karai as they clashed. "Your Splinter's daughter and from what I hear from Leo a strong willed and very stubborn girl. You should be able to beat that thing with ease."

Karai could not tell her some of that might have been the damage done because of the unique circumstances of her mutation even if she had wanted too. "My father is Oroku Saki." She stated firmly. "Leonardo knows nothing."

"That's not the way I heard it." Aaliyah countered as they continued to clash. "The way I heard it you guys were pretty close considering your status as general enemies. He was your friend despite everything for a while there."

Karai hesitated just a bit. "He betrayed me." She said hotly. "He deserves whatever he has coming."

"The last time you were really you, that's not what you believed." Aaliyah said as she remembered what Leo had told her during some training sessions for April and Jennifer to increase their control over their psychic powers. "You wanted Shredder to pay for what he did to your family, for killing your mother and lying to you about your father."

"No." Karai said, her voice just a bit softer this time. Her feelings about her mother were genuine, regardless of whom she though was her father and what man she thought was responsible for her family's demise. "It was Splinter that destroyed my family."

Aaliyah shook her head softly. "No. It was Shredder. Remember, Karai. He killed your mother and kidnapped you to raise as his own. He lied to you about it all those years until you overheard the truth after that weird worm quake thing." Hearing Leo speak of that still boggled her mind a little. She hadn't even met these Kraang things that he had told her about yet.

Jennifer did her best to focus her thoughts and her energies. But she overheard Hector say she was his and she couldn't help but flinch. Not that she hadn't known his opinion of her for at least the last five years but she still hated to hear it. A smile did cross her lips though when Raph reminded him what she had always tried to say to him, she didn't belong to him and she never would.

"I am tired of your lies, turtle girl." Karai decided. "You don't even know me, I don't even know where you came from. You don't belong." She started to swing viciously at Aaliyah.

That actually brought a smile to her lips. "Am I angering you Karai?" She asked as sweetly as she could. She remembered Leo saying angering Raph was what freed him, and Donnie had done the same with Rockwell. She wondered if this might work after all. Sometimes the only thing worse than a friend or enemy trying to tell you your business was a stranger. "You don't like that I know more than you do about your own situation?"

Karai let out a growl and her eyes turned yellow, an indicator of the half snake mutant she now was. "You think your tongue stings me?" She asked. "Let's see if mine will sting you." She sheathed her tonto as her arms became snakes and she started to snap at Aaliyah.

Aaliyah dodged around them as best she could, knowing if one of those things bit her she would end up poisoned and that would not be a good thing at this moment. "I thought you were a ninja." She noted. "A trained fighter. And yet you resort to trying to poison me? Pretty dishonorable if you ask me, but then again when you take the lessons you learned from Shredder to heart what does one expect?"

"Enough." Karai lashed out and tried again for Aaliyah with the snakes but she dodged it.

"No." Aaliyah said. "It won't be enough until that mind control worm is out of you. Until you're home with your father and your brothers, like you should be."

"Look around you." Karai said. "All of your little friends are half tired while we're at full strength. Most of the Foot army doesn't even need to sleep. Nor do the Dark Oni or the white ninja." She laughed. "How do you expect to win?"

"Because we're right." Aaliyah responded. "We're the defenders, the…the 'Turtles of Justice' as Leo would call us. Except we're more than just turtles. That was something you used to know. You came to the turtles and wanted to work together to stop the Kraang invasion despite Shredder. That's the real Karai, not the mind puppet Shredder created. You need to break free of his control."

April looked to Jennifer. "You ready?" She asked.

The blonde nodded. "Ready." She confirmed.

The two girls focused, not on Karai herself but on the mind control worm somewhere in her body, most likely somewhere near her brain. The difference between all of the other attempts and now was that they were trying to force something out of someone that on some level was sentient and could fight back against their efforts.

Aaliyah was still dodging snake arms. "This isn't the way ninja fight, Karai. It isn't the way kunoichi fight." She looked straight at her. "Forget the snakes and face me fairly."

"That coming from a mutant turtle?" Karai smirked but she retracted her arms to be real ones and then drew her tanto. "Alright then. Let's do it." The two girls again began to clash but after another minute she stumbled back with a moan. "What…what's going on?" She wondered.

The two girls were focusing every amount of psychic energy at Karai, or more accurately at the worm residing in her when all of a sudden their concentration was broken by Donnie's shout of "Mikey!" All three girls turned first to Donnie in enough time to see Rahzar make bash Donnie into the ground, which Jennifer swore made April even more concerned that normal.

That soon changed to slightly higher panic of her own when she heard Raph curse and turned in just enough time to see Hector use mantis like scythes to toss Raph hard himself. Both the girls' panics increased tenfold when they saw the blonde's father approaching Mikey.

"No." Jennifer whispered. "He'll use the black burn to kill Mikey." Sure enough she saw her father's arm go blacker than anything else around them and then shoot it straight toward the orange masked turtle.

"No, he won't." Aaliyah vowed and turned her back on Karai to help the youngest turtle…somehow. But as she moved Karai lashed out and kicked her in the back of the legs and made her take a very ungraceful fall.

"Can we deflect that somehow?" April asked as she felt sick to her stomach to see the black burn heading toward the carefree turtle she had come to see like brothers. She had seen them all that way, except now for one though it took her a while to realize that, not to mention some help from her new blonde friend.

"I don't know." Jennifer said softly. "It's never been done before. No one has survived it either." A quick glance confirmed her fears, the Mutanimals were too far away to even realize something was wrong and like Donnie and Raph both Leo and Master Splinter had also been prevented by their adversaries from helping. She already had tears in her eyes, anticipating the death of Mikey.

Then all three girls gasped as they heard another cry of, "No!" and received a shock as Renet stood there, doing what Jennifer didn't even think had been possible. She had stopped the black burn. Gone was the perky and slightly bumbling apprentice time mistress the two of them had briefly met at the at the lair a few days ago. There stood a courageous and confidant young woman whose only thought clearly was to make sure no harm came to someone she seemed to care so much about.

Even more amazing to the young blonde was the look on her father's face. She had seen so many different looks from him and most of them had not been pleasant. But neither had those looks been anything other than smugness or confidence. Those weren't what she saw now. "He's worried." Jennifer whispered.

"Renet somehow knows how to do what even Splinter didn't know could be done." April breathed.

"Who is she?" Aaliyah asked. She and Candy had not been at the lair when everyone else had met Renet.

"That's a new friend." April told her. "Renet Tilley, apprentice time mistress."

"And a girl with great timing." Jennifer added.

It was touching to both girls to see Mikey and Renet have a touching moment but then Jennifer's rather recovered himself and tried to advance. She responded in the only way she knew how, by banishing him through time. She did have the grace to send Jennifer an apologetic look that the blonde dismissed with an understanding shake of her head. She knew better than anyone her father had to be stopped, by whatever means possible.

Moments later April noticed something else that was both creepy and cool. Noi Tai Dar reached out for Chein Khan and Leo gladly delivered that to the demon. Karai noticed as well. "It's just the Foot Clan against your clan now." She stated. Just as Shredder said to Splinter moments later.

"Do or die time, ladies." Aaliyah said as she looked to the blonde and red head. "Let's do it."

The adrenaline shooting through their bodies at the sight of Mikey's near death added extra energy to each of their moves as Aaliyah went on full out attack against Karai. Donnie's successful hit on Rahzar only emboldened them further.

"It's time to come home Karai." April whispered as she and Jennifer took hands and focused all of their energies, again not into the kunoichi but more importantly into the worm that was controlling her.

Aaliyah and Karai were clashing, neither of the young women gaining an edge in the fight. Then Karai felt kind of faint and dropped her weapon, an image of her reminding Leo that a ninja never drops their weapon back when they fought after the Kraang gave them the Footbots. Then she fell to knees and started to cough hard.

Aaliyah sheathed her weapons and ran to the fallen kunoichi. She had been prepared to expect something like this but the actual sight still shocked her. She ran to the girl and started to run her hand gently against her back. "Karai, can you hear me? Help April and Jennifer to fight that worm. Fight for your family. For your freedom." She said softly.

This caused Shredder to lapse in concentration now. "Karai." He gasped. He tried to move to stop the girls from messing with the worm inside of Karai but Splinter tackled him to the ground.

"You will not interfere." Splinter declared. "Tonight Miwa gets to decide for herself again."

Shredder blocked an oncoming attack from Leo.

Karai coughed again. "Stop it." She rasped out, though it was hard to tell now if the worm were speaking on behalf of Karai to keep its control or if Karai was speaking , and if it was the girl speaking than to who or what she was speaking too.

For what it was worth none of his henchman seemed that concerned about what was going on with Karai.

Nor for that matter was the one henchman still standing that was not a member of the Foot. Hector tried to focus his energies on cutting Raph to pieces but not only was the red masked turtle dodging at every single strike but he was constantly getting stuck at by Mikey which was a huge distraction. Renet didn't seem quite so sure how she should react now. Knowing what Jennifer knew about him, she couldn't blame her. Then it occurred to her Renet might know about Hector too, she seemed to know a lot about them rather she wanted to admit it or not.

Shredder tried to again get to Karai but now Donnie got in the way and smacked Shredder in the face with his staff. "You're losing Shredder. In more ways than one." He stated.

Karai made heaving sound that made Aaliyah flinch and start to feel just the slightest bit panicked and then the kunoichi made a gagging sound before she threw up, what seemed to be not only her last meal but some blood and more importantly the worm.

"It worked." April gasped in some surprise as she and Jennifer ran over to her.

Aaliyah took her bunrei and stabbed the small worm just to play it safe. Then she looked to April and Jennifer. "You watch Karai. I'm going to help Raph and Mikey put Hector down." It was clear from her tone of voice she had never liked him. Both girls nodded.

Splinter was glad to see that the girl's plan seemed to have worked. He looked to Leonardo. "Help Aaliyah and your brother's to get rid of Hector and then all of you can help me with the Shredder, my sons." He said.

Leo and Donnie hesitated only a moment but then nodded. "Hai, sensei." They conceded.

Hector grabbed Mikey as he swung his nunchuck at him and then tossed him hard into Raph. Both turtles had the wind knocked out of them. "Mikey, Raph." Renet gasped. She started to run over to the two turtles.

One of Hector's arms changed to be similar to that of a gorilla and he lashed out and grabbed Renet's arm, the one holding the time scepter. He knew what she could do with that after what she had done to his boss. "Not so fast, little girl." He growled as he brought the scythed hand to the top of her chest, just above her throat. "Maybe it's time I got to know you a little bit better." Renet gulped at that statement, as she knew everything that Jennifer knew thanks to their future associations.

Aaliyah came up from behind him and kicked him in the back to force him to release Renet, then drove the blunt end of her bunrei's into the back of both of his knees. She then jumped in front of him. "You know, I never did like your attitude about women." She stated icily and then delivered a front kick hard to his face.

"You turtle freak." Hector spat. "I should have eliminated you and that street axolotl girl long ago." He moved to attack Aaliyah but now Leo and Donnie were on either side of her. He then turned to see Renet had made it to Mikey and Raph's side. She was helping the orange masked turtle up as the red masked turtle recovered his sais and shot him a menacing glare.

"You guys ever heard the expression turtle power?" Aaliyah asked the guys.

"Not really." Mikey admitted.

"Why?" Raph asked impatiently.

"Because I think in a minute Chameleon here will learn all about it." Aaliyah said with a joyful smile.

"I think you're right." Leo agreed and together the blue and white masked turtles leapt into the air and delivered a double jump kick to Hector's chest.

Raph and Mikey caught on and swept his legs out from under him. He landed hard as all four brothers and Aaliyah all came to stand together. The mutant shifter stood up and glared at the now five turtles.

"All together now." Leo said. They all jumped up into the air and with five simultaneous statements of "Booyakasha!" they kicked Hector hard in the chest, he went flying far enough to be thrown off the roof. It wasn't quite what the five of them had expected and they ran to the edge but they saw nothing. This further question was heightened by the fact the Dark Oni vanished.

"Is he dead?" Mikey asked.

"There's no way to tell right now." Leo said. "We can see if there's any…evidence on the way out." He looked to his three younger brothers and Aaliyah. "Right now we have to help Master Splinter."

Bebop had gone back to his old tricks of invisibility and shooting laser beams. Despite his every instinct the mutant warthog had taken the monkey scientists words to heart and reverted to silence. However Rockwell changed his tactics and started to reflect the laser beams at the other foot clan mutants.

A laser beam shocked Fishface and allowed Candy and Mondo to go with a double tale slam right to his face for the knockout.

Stockman was the next to get the knockout combo from a laser beam and a dive bomb from Pigeon Pete.

Rocksteady was trying to squeeze the life out of Leatherhead when a laser beam got him in the small of the back. He yelped in pain and then Leatherhead brought his two fists down hard on the mutant rhino's head for the KO.

Tiger Claw traded blows with Slash and was easily able to dodge the laser shots until Pidgeon Pete dive bombed the mutant assassin. He roared and tossed the mutant bird off of him but he turned in enough time to see, but not dodge, the mace attack that sent Tiger Claw flying over the edge as well. Slash was sure the jet pack would save him but he hoped that at least it would stop him from coming back into this fight.

Bebop realized what he had inadvertently done. "Um, oopsie." He tried for.

That only resulted in Leatherhead using both of his arms to grab the mutant warthog, in the process crushing the invisibility device, and then the mutant gator slammed him into the concrete hard.

"It's a good thing we just did that." Mondo noted. "Because there are no opposing minions, which means…" They all followed his gaze to see what was left of the Footbots approaching them rapidly.

"Well, that's just great." Pete noted as he got ready to go again.

"What happened?" The two girls heard Karai's raspy voice as she looked around. "O'Neil?"

"You don't remember?" Jennifer asked her.

Karai shook her head. "Last I remember was saying goodbye at Coney island…no wait, I remember threatening to pluck Stockman's wings if he didn't release the restraints. He was…" She was clearly confused.

"Shredder developed a mind control worm and serum that he used to control you after he acquired you somehow." April explained.

"It was Zeck and Steranko." Karai remembered suddenly. "They captured me after I left you guys." She took a breath, it hurt just a little bit. "Now I'm here. I…don't remember anything."

"That must be because of the effect of your mutation." April replied. "You said your mind was going and you didn't want to be a threat. Somehow it's been pretty much restored now but there must still be some residual damage. You don't remember nearly poisoning us on Shredder's orders or the gang war we've all been in in the last month."

"Nope." Karai admitted. "Not a memory." Except she did recall one suddenly as she looked around and saw a fight. She remembered kissing Casey Jones though she didn't know why. "Someone better go help him." She noted.

April saw Hun starting to get the upper hand over Casey. "I better go." She said.

"April, I don't think you're going to be able to help much." Jennifer said softly. "Mikey barely did it with Casey and Mondo."

"If Mikey did it then I can do it." Karai said as she stood then and recovered her weapon.

"Are you sure you're up to it?" Jennifer asked the kunoichi as she looked gently down at the blood and vomit.

"Who are you anyway?" Karai asked with slight impatience.

"This is Jennifer Quinn." April answered. "A new friend and Raphael's girlfriend."

That took her slightly off guard but nodded. "Okay then. Don't worry, stop the Footbots. I'll help your friend Casey." Then before they could argue she ran off.

The two girls stared at each other dumbfounded for a moment then went to help the Mutanimals. They also noticed for what it's worth Renet was doing what she could too. The time scepter did make for a decent blunt weapon.

"it's over Saki." Splinter stated as Aaliyah and his sons joined him. "You have lost."

"Not yet." Shredder stated and attacked again. Even with six on one he was easily able to repel the turtles though he got as good as he gave to his nemesis.

"It is over boy." Hun said as he kicked Casey hard in the solar plexus and then got prepared to drive his foot into his neck.

"Not so fast." Karai intervened and kicked Hun backwards. "Let's see how you do against me, Purple Dragon."

"I see the tides have changed." Hun observed. He attacked Karai but the skilled kunoichi was able to counter him easily and they ended up going back and forth for a moment. By that point though Casey recovered and came around and slammed a hockey stick into the head and back of the Dragon's leader. He was stunned and Karai kicked him hard against the side of the building.

"Nice job Jones." Karai said.

"Nice to really meet you Karai." Casey said. "Not bad at all…I mean…"

"Yeah, that was one interesting kiss." Karai revealed before heading off to help her father and brothers and leaving the vigilante stunned speechless.

The instant the Shredder next turned around he found himself facing down not only the Mutanimals but someone else as well. "Karai." He whispered.

"As I said once before, it's over Shredder." Karai stated. Renet, April, and Jennifer had hung back each of them knowing they were not ready to face the Shredder.

Shredder glared angrily at them all. Then he realized one other problem. His minions were down and the Footbots were destroyed. He appeared to be alone. Then he laughed rather humorlessly. "Do you really think I come to a confrontation like this without a backup plan?"

"It would be nice to think you're that dumb." Mikey tried to volunteer and Shredder sent him back a death glare.

At that point the glaring omissions showed up. On one of each of the four sides of the buildings stood four of the five heralds; Fire, Water, Air and Earth. Above them hovered the last herald the one of Metal. The unconscious minions as well as Shredder himself (bar Tiger Claw who was not on the roof) were starting to get levitated up.

"Finish them off." Shredder commanded the Foot Heralds. A massive beam quickly gathered overhead and shot down a massive beam at them. Shredder look forward to the end of his nemesis and everyone who chose to ally with him.

Then at the last moment he saw the new girl lift the strange object in the air and they all vanished. His scream of wrath resounded though none but the heralds were there to hear it.

One moment each of them were bracing themselves for the inevitable end. The next moment they found themselves in the lair.

"What just happened?" Slash asked, confused.

Donnie looked to Renet. "Did you do that?" He asked her.

"Yes." Renet said firmly. "Only it was kind of a gamble because I didn't know if it would take us home, take us back in time, or do the job for the heralds."

They all looked shocked and then gave a sigh of resignation. What mattered right now was that the apprentice time mistress's gamble had paid off. But that lead to the next question. What now?

Is Renet in trouble? What will Karai do? What will Aaliyah and Candy do? What will Shredder's revenge be. Next we wind down with the aftermath to this war.


	26. Aftermath one

Mikey: Don't own TMNT. If you don't see it on show it's different. Imagine if you were watching us on TV as you were watching TV. It'd be TV on TV.

Raph: Don't be stupid.

While Donnie insisted on taking Karai into the lab to make sure she was okay after the battle and the ejection of the worm, the others kind of started to celebrate. Pizza was ordered. Mikey brought out Ice Cream Kitty with the sodas that she could join in the celebration too.

All except for Aaliyah and Candy who went just outside of the turnstiles so they could talk.

"You wanna be human again?" Aaliyah asked Candy. "If it can happen?"

The axolotl girl shook her head. "I don't think so." She answered. "I have no reason to go back to being human." She blushed just a bit. "And I might have more of a reason to stay this way. You?"

Aaliyah shrugged. "I don't know." She admitted. "I have a family who is probably wondering where I am, and I am mildly famous." She glanced back at the lair. "Still, like you I might have a reason to stay this way too." She took a deep breath. "But until the chance comes up it doesn't really matter what we want to do."

"True." Candy said and took a deep breath. "But, that being said there is one thing I want to do that has already come up." She turned to look at the girl that was the closest thing she had had to a friend since before she was a pre-teen. "I'm going to go with the Mutanimals, to their lair. And I'm going to join their group. Of course that is if Slash will let me."

"I thought you might do that." Aaliyah admitted with a small smile. She sighed just a bit. "I won't be coming with you. If Master Splinter and the guys are okay with it, I'm going to stay here with them. I feel as fellow mutant turtles they might be able to help me adjust, especially if this is the way I am for the rest of my life."

Candy smiled, though a little sadly. "I get that. It's cool." She shrugged a bit. "But hey the turtles and the Mutanimals seem to be tight and I even heard that before mutating Slash was Raph's pet, so it's not like we're saying good bye. We're just taking a different path on the same street."

Aaliyah laughed. "Yeah." She agreed and both mutant girls hugged each other for a moment before separating. "Well before our paths go a different way we're both invited to a 'we saved the world' party." Both girls got up and returned to the lair.

Raph had sat down on the couch to polish his sais as Jennifer sat next to him, checking out her weapons for damage as Splinter had taught her to do. "I hope that's the last intense fight we have to go through for a while." Jennifer said to him.

Raph laughed. "Yeah, I know what you mean. But somehow I don't think we should hold our breath on it." He replied.

Jennifer giggled. "Me neither." She agreed. She leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. "Thank you."

Raph truly looked confused. "For what?" He asked her.

"For standing up for me, for being there for me, for accepting me as I am. Damaged and all." The blonde answered.

Raph set his sai on the table, reached over and stroked Jennifer's hair and cheek. "You're not damaged Jennifer." The red masked turtle stated. "You've been used and abused and yet you come out as a charming, intelligent, and caring young woman. That takes more strength than you realize." He laughed just a bit. "Especially when you fall for a freak like me."

"No, you're not a freak." Jennifer said. "None of you are. You are far more kind, caring, and generous than a lot of humans out there, male or female." She leaned over and kissed him on the lips gently this time. "And I am so grateful that all of you accepted me into your lives."

"And thank you Renet." Splinter said as he looked toward the apprentice time mistress, who sat by Mikey and was also playing with Ice Cream Kitty. "For showing up when you did. If not for you my youngest son would be dead right now, and perhaps we all would too."

Renet waved it off. "Nah, I think you guys would have found a way. After all, they're not the Turtle Heroes of Legend for nothing." She replied.

"Are you going to get in trouble with Lord Simultaneous?" Jennifer asked her.

"Yeah, are you leaving now?" Mikey asked now.

Renet shrugged. "If I'm in trouble, then it's too late to worry about it." She smiled at them all and saved the last look for Mikey. "No reason not to stay for pizza."

"Sounds like your kind of girl alright." Raph said which made Mikey blush.

April had been waiting by the lab door waiting for Donnie to finish examining Karai to make sure she was okay. She heard just enough of their conversation that she knew when Donnie let her go. Karai came out and was startled to see her. "O'Neill." She said a bit surprised.

"Hey." April said. "So you have clean bill of health?"

"Donatello wants to watch my vitals for a couple of days." Karai told the red head. "But he thinks I should be okay."

"That's good." April said. She was eager to talk to Donnie about what had happened on the roof…well maybe eager wasn't the right word but she wanted to make sure they were on the same page.

"Look O'N…April." Karai said. It was clear this was hard for her but she got it out. "Thank you, for what you did. I know it wasn't just you of course but you're the first I ran into so…thank you for saving me from the mind control worm."

April gave her a small but genuine smile. "You're welcome Karai. I'm sure you'll more than make amends for the rescue if you're staying around." She replied.

"I think I am." Karai told her. "I mean Shredder will still come after me and I have nowhere else to go. Most importantly, Splinter is my father and the turtles are my brothers."

"And the rest of us will be your friends, if you let us." April said to her gently but firmly.

Karai laughed just a little. "We'll see, we'll see." She started to walk off but couldn't resist firing off, "Later princess." With a small wave.

April might have been more annoyed with Karai's comment but she had other things to worry about right now as she knocked on Donnie's lab door. "Hey, Donnie. Got a moment?" She asked,

Donnie almost jumped . "A-April." He seemed startled. "H-hey. Come on over…I mean come on in." He was babbling, a behavior April had noticed had been getting less and less frequent as he had gotten used to April.

April came in and stood near his desk. "I…I kind of figured we needed to talk about what happened on the rooftop, after destroying the demon wall and before everyone else showed up." She said, her hand reaching up to twist a bit of her nervously.

Donnie seemed to deflate just a little. "I know. You don't have to really say it." The purple masked turtle stated, sounding a bit depressed. "It was an adrenaline packed, spur of the moment kiss since I saved your life and I shouldn't read too much into it." He said.

"You do tend to read too much into a lot of things." April teased him gently as she came and leaned down in front of him. She reached out and took Donnie's hands. "Please do us both a favor and continue to read too much into that."

"Huh?" Donnie asked, looking confused. "I understand nothing."

April laughed a little. "It took me a long while to sort out my feelings, I know. And I'd be lying if I didn't admit that on some level I do feel an attraction to Casey. But he's not the guy I want to be with." She reached up and placed her hand under his chin to make sure he was looking at her. "You are."

"You're positive?" Donnie asked her.

"If anything I should ask you that." April replied. "I mean for the longest time I was the only one you'd ever seen if one doesn't count Karai."

"That's what Raph said when I first saw you and proclaimed you the most beautiful girl I'd ever seen." Donnie confessed sheepishly. "None the less my point still stood then, and my point still stands now."

April felt a small blush enter her cheeks. "I watched Jennifer as she grew closer to Raph, and she did it without any doubts or fears or hesitations, and I have to give her a ton of credit for her ability to realize what she wanted a lot quicker than I have." She said. She leaned over and kissed him on the lips again, more gently though. "I want to try and make this work Donnie. That is, if you do."

Donnie's smile was so proverbially bright that he seemed to light up the lab more so. "I am so game." He answered her.

"Great." April said. "But first I do need to tell Casey about this. It's going to be a bit of a downer for him after having helped save the world, but I can't lead him on now that I know what I want."

Donnie nodded. "I understand." He promised. "He's our friend, and he was in fact there for you when you weren't sure what to think about us after the mutation situation."

April patted Donnie's hands gently. "Come on, let's join our friends for the party." She said. The two of them started to out of the lab.

Karai made her way over to Raph and Jennifer. "Hey." She said. She knew out of all the turtles Raph had been the one that had taken the most time to accept her as part of their family.

"Hi." Raph said. "Donnie said you were okay?"

Karai nodded. "Yeah, wants to keep an eye on me but he thinks I should be okay."

Raph nodded. "Cool."

Karai looked to the beautiful lithe blonde that had won Raph's heart and at the same time seemed to have mellowed him just a little. "Thank you Jennifer, for helping to set me free from the mind control worm." She said.

"You're welcome." Jennifer said softly.

"Take that as a major compliment." Raph said to his girlfriend and he smirked a bit. "She's not good at saying thank you." He shot his older sister a teasing look. "Ain't that right?"

Karai laughed. "Yeah well something tells me I'm going to have to get better at that kind of thing." She replied.

"You'll get it." Jennifer promised. "I'd bet my life on it."

"Yeah." Karai echoed. She had to admit Jennifer seemed to be a good person, and that might be good for Raph. But only time would tell. She smiled again and walked away.

"She might just be okay." Raph said with a small smile as he reached over to stroke Jennifer's hair.

Casey came in with the pizzas and Slash started to pass out sodas.

April took a deep breath and then walked over to Casey. "Hey, can we talk a second?" She asked him.

"Is this about the kiss you and Donnie shared on the roof?" Casey asked her, sounding just the slightest bit upset, perhaps even bitter.

April blushed just a little. "Yeah…it is. Please let me explain." She admitted and Casey gave her a nod to go ahead though he crossed his arms over his chest. "I've been kind of thinking about…Donnie and me for a while. It really intensified when I saw how Jennifer reacted with Raph, and vice versa. Although I know it's a long road, they've proven there's a good chance it could work." She took a deep breath, both to let her friend absorb what she said and to gather her thoughts too. "I feel as if Donnie and I deserve that chance too, as long as we're both willing to take it. And we are."

"Congratulations, Red." Casey said and despite the fact he still sounded a little defeated about it he seemed genuine. "Look April. When we were at the farm house, after the Speed Demon thing, Donnie and I had a little chat. We both agreed that it was one of three things. You'd choose me, you'd choose him, or you'd choose neither of us. Either way we decided that we couldn't let that end our friendship."

"I'm glad Casey. I still want you to be my friend, and I'm sure Donnie feels the same way." April said. "I know it'll take some time for you to be fully okay with it."

Casey shook his head. "Don't worry about me Red, I'll be fine." He reached over and took April's hand, squeezing it gently. "You worry about yourself and Donnie. I'll worry about me and someone when that time comes." The two human friends hugged gently and then they headed back toward the others. Casey didn't point out that she may not be the only one whose options had opened up.

As they all sat down to eat Splinter looked at the two mutant girls. "So where do you two plan on going now?" He asked them. "I can only assume your original homes are not an option."

"It never was in my case." Candy said with an edge in her voice. "Truth is I've been living on the streets since I was almost thirteen. My dad left us and my mom died of an overdose. I knew at that age the only way I wouldn't be bounced from foster to foster home until I was eighteen was to fend for myself. So I did."

"Do you plan on going back out there?" Mondo asked, slightly concerned. He had been on the streets for a year after he had been kicked out of his parent's house for being a mutant but again by then he had been a mutant. A couple months later he had fallen in with Xever and but had learned the truth thanks to Mikey and Casey. Weeks later he had been introduced to the Mighty Mutanimals and they had gladly taken him in, and were even happier about it after he agreed to give them a trial run. That had worked pretty well so far.

"That isn't necessary." Slash said as he set down his soda can. "You're more than welcome to join with us. You've proven yourself brave and strong during this incident despite what Fulcanelli wanted of you."

Candy seemed just the slightest bit startled. She thought only Rockwell was the mind reader. Of course for all she knew the mutant monkey had read her mind and told Slash about her desire. Still, it worked well for her. "That sounds great Slash. Thank you."

"And what of you Aaliyah?" Splinter asked the white masked female turtle though he suspected he already knew what she would want.

Aaliyah took a deep breath. "With your permission Master Splinter, I would like to stay here with you, Jennifer and the other turtles. At least for a little while." She requested.

"Why?" Raph asked her bluntly. His suspicious nature still kicked in very easily despite the influence of his girlfriend, especially when said nature was about an enemy, regardless of how reluctant and position that was.

"Raph." Leo tried to interject, being far more trusting than his red masked brother.

"It's a fair question." Aaliyah interjected now as she held up her hand to forestall any argument. "I do have a few reasons. First, I am hoping that you all could help me adjust to any difficulties I might have as I get used to being a mutant turtle." She looked to Splinter now. "Second, I don't know many people who can offer me anything else to learn about the martial arts or myself, but I believe you are one of those people who can." She took a moment to catch her breath. "Finally I want to make up for whatever I need to and I can't think of a better place to atone aside from perhaps with the Mutanimals."

Leo shot a warning look to Raph in case he wanted to tell her to go with them instead but he saw a look of what passed for satisfaction and acceptance on his face.

"You may stay here, child." Splinter told Aaliyah. "And I will be more than happy to include you in our training sessions." He smiled a bit. "I have noticed that you are skilled enough to rival with Leonardo, and that is by no means an easy feat. Only Raphael has done so." Splinter did not bring to light the last reason he suspected, she wanted the chance to get to know Leo better.

Renet smiled. She knew that was exactly the reason. It was a reason she was finding she could share when it came to another turtle in the family.

"And that's not always because of pure skill." Leo added teasingly which earned him a semi-mock glare from his brother.

Splinter did notice one other change as well. April sat closer to Donnie than she had in the past and he suspected he knew why though unlike Casey he had not seen his son and the red head kiss. Still it didn't take much for him to figure it out, especially in conjunction with Raph and Jennifer.

"What about you Karai?" Leo asked her, the girl who was their older sister. "What are your plans now that you're free of Shredder?"

"The same they were when I found out the truth." Karai answered. "Shredder will come after me, and you are all my family." She looked a little flustered now. "Assuming of course I'm still welcome, father." She looked to Splinter.

The rat master smiled at her. "Nothing would please me more than to have you home, my daughter."

For what it was worth all four of the turtles, her brothers, chimed in with their agreements.

"Hope that's fine with you too." Karai said as she looked to Jennifer.

In truth the blonde knew that what she thought about this probably didn't mean much. But out of all of the one's living in the lair she also truly had the least reason to not give her the benefit of the doubt. "I think it'll be neat." She said.

They continued to talk and celebrate for a little while longer, Ice Cream Kitty enjoyed the mass amounts of attention she got between Mikey, Jennifer and Renet, Aaliyah seemed to enjoy petting her and even Karai conceded to stroke her head a minute.

Finally Slash stood up. "Well, we should get home Mutanimals." He announced. "We still have some work ahead of us, making room for our new resident among them. And we should enjoy it while we can because who knows when the next crisis will arise."

The others laughed just a bit, though they all knew the truth behind it. Mondo reached over to help Candy to her feet and they all turned toward the turnstiles with the turtles and their human companions rising too.

"I'll see you soon." Aaliyah said to Candy as she gave her a hug.

"I'll hold you to that." The axolotl girl replied. "You're the first friend I've had since I ended up on the streets. I'm very grateful for that."

"Don't worry too much about it." Leatherhead told the two female mutants. "We only live minutes from the turtles, so it's easy enough if we need to get together for business or fun."

"Awesome." Both girls said and then giggled.

"I need to go home too." Casey said. "It's getting really late and my dad will freak if I'm not there when he wakes up."

"Me too." April said. "My dad knows what's going on and all but he'll still panic anyway."

"It is a parent's prerogative." Splinter assured the two of them. "And it is not always just for one's own children." He added as he placed a comforting hand on Jennifer's shoulder, though it was also a reminder that as far as he was concerned, she was part of the family as well.

"Walk you home Red?" Casey asked his now just friend who happened to be a girl friend.

April nodded. "Sounds great." She leaned up and kissed Donnie on the lips gently for a moment before pulling back. "I'll see you tomorrow." She promised.

Donnie nodded. "Looking forward to that."

With that April, Casey and the Mutanimals walked past the turnstiles and around the corner.

"You are so lucky I can't tease you right now." Raph said to Donnie.

Donnie laughed. "I'd invite you to bring me down Raph, but you so have no room to talk anyway." He replied.

"I should go too." Renet said. "I should count myself so lucky that Lord Simultaneous hasn't already tracked me down to bust me."

"See you again?" Mikey asked her, actually kind of shy.

Renet giggled. "As soon as I can." She promised. "Which might seem longer to me than to you, I don't really know. Or maybe longer to you than to me. Or…" She shrugged. "I'm an apprentice time mistress and time travel can still hurt my head." She confessed.

"Well that's one thing I think we can agree on." Raph assured her.

Renet leaned over and kissed Mikey on the cheek. "See you all in time." She promised before she activated the time scepter, stepped through the time door and it then closed behind her.

Mikey couldn't help but look a little forlorn. After all Raph and Donnie had their girlfriends in the right time and Raph's even lived with them. Even Leo's love interest, regardless of who it might be, was here too. Yet the only girl he had interest in wasn't even in the same city, let alone the same time.

Raph came over and punched his brother lightly in the arm. "Don't sweat it Mikey." He said to his youngest brother. "I'd bet anything she'll be back very soon. For some strange reason she really seems to like you."

Mikey smiled. "Yeah, I guess that's true." He conceded. "She did risk getting into huge trouble to help us and she even did go a long way just to save me." He walked over and picked up Ice Cream Kitty. "Better get you back in the freezer before you melt away to nothing."

"Mror?" Ice Cream Kitty seemed to question for a moment, then licked his nose, leaving a bit of ice cream on his nose.

Mikey licked it off of his nose. "So cold." He said gleefully as he carried Ice Cream Kitty to the kitchen.

"Tomorrow we will have to arrange rooms for you." Splinter said to Aaliyah and his daughter. "Tonight we will have to make other arrangements."

"I'll be fine wherever." Karai said. As a kunoichi she had adapted to many places to sleep at.

"Same here." Aaliyah said. "I spent about half of my life in various hotel rooms as I did competitions and Fulcanelli didn't exactly offer us rooms at the Hilton during his 'employ'."

"One of you guys can stay in my room tonight." Jennifer volunteered.

"You go ahead." Karai said to the female mutant turtle. "I think I'm going to need a bit of time before I even try to do the girl bonding thing."

Aaliyah smiled a bit. "Alright. Of course when you're ready for that, I'll be more than willing to help with that. I'm sure Jennifer, Candy and April will be too."

"Maybe we can even get Renet to join us." Jennifer added with her own smile.

"Maybe." Karai said. "I'll get back to you on that one." She was certainly very serious about that but there was still a twinkle in her eye that let them know she appreciated the attempt.

"Then you can sleep here in the living room tonight." Splinter told his daughter gently. "Tomorrow we will get both you and Aaliyah rooms to stay in."

"We have a few extra rooms we've never really done anything with." Donnie said. "We can go see what we can find for your rooms after April and Casey come over tomorrow."

"That is indeed for tomorrow." Splinter agreed. "Right now I suggest you all unwind and then get a good night's sleep. The Shredder and the Foot clan are still active and it is anyone's guess when we will see them again."

Renet showed up right where she had left and right in front of where the time scepter would go stood Lord Simultaneous. "Of course." She let out with a small sigh. She gently brushed past her mentor to return the scepter. "How much trouble am I in now?" She asked him.

"Return to your dusting Renet." He replied. "We will discuss this later."

Renet nodded and bowed slightly. "As you say, master." She said and then started off.

Lord Simultaneous stared after the girl. He would of course have to figure out something that would suit as some form of punishment but he couldn't really be that harsh with Renet. The truth is that he knew she would do that and in fact it was what she was expected to do. It would be the first step in what would be a long but fruitful journey for the young time mistress.

Elsewhere in New York a portal door opened. Anyone who was near it might have heard what could easily be called the screaming of the damned. From it stepped a male human looking form, except for the fact it seemed to have no hair and one could see small horns poking out of his head. He looked around and laughed a bit. "Let' see what we can do here." He commented.

The gang war is over, everyone is set. But what new threats await our heroes? Is this new figure part of a new problem or are there other things in store? How well will Karai adapt to her new surroundings? Answers to come soon.


	27. Stings and Bites

Mikey: One of these villains is not like the other. That's because one of them is owned by Nickelodeon and the other is not. TMNT is also owned by Nick in general. If you see it on the show then it's owned already if not then the author owns it.

Raph: Alright, stop babbling Mikey.

A couple of days passed. Karai had her own room established; she almost called it a sanctuary as it was the one place she could be alone at. Not that she wasn't grateful to be back with her father and her brothers. She enjoyed cooking with Mikey (growing up the way she did she learned to cook at a pretty early age, at least in so much as sandwiches and ramen went as cooking); she enjoyed bantering with Raph (they were equally sarcastic and opinionated); she enjoyed discussing literature with Donnie (as they say knowledge is power and they both had a good amount of literary intellect) and she enjoyed sparring not only with her eldest brother Leo but with their new house guest Aaliyah as well. She even found she enjoyed Jennifer's calm and thoughtful demeanor though in truth the two girls had very little in common aside from the people they chose to spend their time with.

Still there was also something to be said about being alone, to meditate and reflect. So much had after all happened in her life that she was still trying to process it. It was still a little strange to be so familiar with people she had been taught were her enemies, even though technically she wasn't taught that Jennifer and Aaliyah were her enemies beyond being part of the family in general though that was because they had not been around. Donnie was still insistent on monitoring her to make sure Stockman hadn't fudged something up somewhere as well and the truth is that idea concerned her too.

Aaliyah too had gotten her own room set up. Unlike Karai at times Aaliyah seemed to thrive with the idea of being around the turtles, Jennifer, Casey and April. She had revealed that competing as she had left her with very little time for friends especially since she had been home schooled. She didn't spend too much time not being around someone though.

Mostly though it was Leo or Mikey. Although neither turtle could take a girlfriend out for a proper date without mass preparation that neither of them had been able to get the time for yet Donnie and April spent a lot of time in the lab together. Mostly talking, getting to know each other on a level that hadn't seemed quite as easy as just friends. Sometimes they were kissing.

Raph and Jennifer were likewise the same way, talking softly and holding hands. Watching TV together. Sometimes Jennifer would read by the red masked turtle's side as he watched TV, other times he would read comics as she watched something.

Sometimes when Casey was over though Raph would spend time with his best friend. That worked out well as that gave Aaliyah and Jennifer a chance to spend time together too and Karai suspected the two were quickly thinking of the each other as sisters despite the fact that Jennifer didn't have any siblings and while Aaliyah mentioned a sister she wasn't yet ready to say anything more about someone who might not even be able to be a part of her life anymore. It made sense since they were the only ones living in the lair that were not already related in some way. Sometimes Karai had to privately admit that she felt just a little jealous of how easily they were bonding. She was not sure she was looking forward to when April would finally branch out a little further than her new boyfriend and join in the girl fest.

Of course for a few hours a day there was also training to be done. It was the one time aside from dinner that they all really spent time together. Splinter easily integrated Aaliyah into the normal training routine that Karai and the four turtle brothers would do while he would set aside different things for April and Jennifer, who were not as highly trained despite all they had done over the last month or so.

Karai woke up one morning and decided to take a few minutes for meditation. She could hear an episode of Crognard the Barbarian from the living room and was sure Mikey was up. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She could hear someone playing pinball, most likely Raph. She could hear work of some kind in the lab that was obvious Donnie. She could hear the subtle sounds of sparring, of metal clashing, and knew that had to be Leo and Aaliyah. She heard the water running and was sure that had to be Jennifer showering. She laughed a bit. She of course could not hear her father but suspected Splinter was meditating as she was though he would do so for longer. "I've been living here too long." She whispered to herself amused.

"Oh yeah." Mikey commented happily. "Show those nasty trolls what happens when they miss Crognard and his mighty pecks."

"Do you know how corny that sounds Mikey?" Raph questioned his younger brother but then sighed. "Of course look at the corn ball that I'm talking too."

Karai heard the swishing of the turnstile and assumed that either Casey or April had shown up now. Most likely April as she had been more eager than normal to be here now that she was with Donnie. Then she called out, "Guys!" With a tone of voice that Karai knew meant something was up.

"April, what's wrong?" Donnie asked as he practically came running out of his lab. "Are you okay?" He looked her over as he walked over to her and was relieved to see nothing wrong with her.

Leo and Aaliyah were coming out of the dojo with Splinter behind them. "What is the matter April?" The rat master asked the red head.

Karai had come out of her room now as well but didn't say anything.

"I woke up this morning and my dad was gone." April revealed.

"Could he be at work?" Mikey asked his friend.

"I thought about that too." She admitted. "But as I was leaving the house to come here I was overhearing a lot of teenagers talking about how their parents or grandparents had gone too."

"A weird coincidence." Karai said. "But it might be nothing more."

April looked to her. "I don't think it's a coincidence." She said to the kunoichi. She thought there was the slightest hint of annoyance in her voice but if she was right about her dad and countless other adults she had reason to be. "One was saying his mother was sick and couldn't have gotten out of bed very well. Another was saying her father had the day off and they were planning to go to a movie marathon."

"Which ones?" Mikey asked.

"Does it matter? "Raph questioned back as he bopped Mikey on the head.

At that point Casey Jones came in too. "Guys, you won't believe this." He started.

"is your dad missing too?" Leo asked him. "And little sister?"

Casey shook his head. "Nah, she's okay. Had to get a friend to keep an eye on her for a while since bringing her here to the lair was probably not a good option." He answered and took a deep breath. "The thing is he was supposed to take my sister shopping today and he wasn't home and he didn't leave a note at all."

Karai gave April something like an apologetic look. "Seems it's more than a coincidence after all, but what is going on?" She wondered.

"Maybe I can hack into some satellites and see if we can figure something out." Donnie suggested. "I mean most likely the disappearing adults have to be somewhere in New York."

"What if that doesn't work?" Jennifer asked. Truthfully it was the kind of question that if Mikey had asked it would have gotten another kind of response but no one had an answer for that one.

"We could always try to call Renet." Mikey suggested kind of hopefully.

"We don't even know how to contact her." Raph reminded him.

"Yeah, we should totally do something about that one." Mikey replied.

"T-phones aren't exactly known for traversing time barriers." Donnie reminded his younger brother as he started to into his lab to hack the satellites like had suggested.

April wasn't sure if she should follow her new boyfriend into the lab or not, but after a moment she settled on going to sit on the couch besides Jennifer right now. Casey sat on a bean bag though it was clear he was restless.

"So, what movie were they going to see?" Mikey asked April again and Raph slapped him on the back of the head again.

"This is unbelievable." April said, more to herself than to anyone else. "Every time I turn around I keep losing my dad. The Kraang abduct him for months, he gets transformed into a bat mutant for months, and he gets mutated during the Kraang invasion for a few more months and now this." She sighed a bit. "What happens if this time it's permanent and I never see him again?"

Jennifer placed hand over her friend's hand as Karai came over to stand in front of her. "Get over it O'Neill." She stated.

April looked up at her, anger blazing in her eyes. "Excuse me." She demanded.

Splinter was about to step in but Leo stopped his father, thinking he knew what Karai was trying to accomplish.

"We get it." Karai stated flatly as she crossed her arms over her chest. "Your dad has disappeared a few times. But he has always been brought back. You don't know it's any different this time so stop wallowing in self-pity and start focusing your energies on what we have to do to make sure this time is no different." She looked over to Casey. "And that last part applies to you too Jones."

The fire in April's eyes boiled down to a simmer as she considered the kunoichi's words. "You're right Karai." She finally said. "Until I know otherwise this is no different and we will bring my dad home. I just hope it doesn't take months."

"That one I'll agree with." Karai replied with a small wink.

"You are right though." Casey said. "We need to get out there and find answers unless Donnie can provide us with something pretty damn quick here."

"Not that I think you're wrong." Aaliyah said to Karai. "But we need to know something before we can act or we might be chasing the wrong horse, and not be in enough time to catch the right one."

Mikey looked at Aaliyah confused. "We're chasing horses now?" he asked. "Don't you know Raph hates riding horses?"

Raph placed his head against his palm in exasperation. "It's a metaphor Mikey." He growled out.

"We're having tempura now?" Mikey asked, even more confused. Raph sighed again and threw up his hands.

"No, what Raph means is that Aaliyah was just using that as an example." Jennifer explained to the youngest turtle patiently, a stark contrast to her boyfriend's attitude at the moment. "What Aaliyah is trying to say is that if we're going looking for a problem without knowing what it is, we might be too late to stop the real problem."

Mikey nodded. "Oh, uh huh. Okay, Okay." He agreed.

Raph raised an eye at him. "Did you understand what Jennifer was saying? Really?" He questioned.

"I think so." Mikey said. "She was saying we can't go out until we know what we're going out for."

"Correct." Splinter confirmed.

"I think I got something guys." Donnie said as he popped out of his lab. "According to satellite images, enhanced by infrared scanners, there is a huge concentration of people about ten miles south of New York."

"That doesn't make any sense." Leo said as he started to pace. "Why would anyone take adults there?"

"Wait a minute." April interjected. "We were talking about that in class a few weeks ago. They're just putting finishing touches on an indoor arboretum there. They plan on turning it into a nature preserve of some sorts."

"Why would all the adults go there though?" Casey asked.

"I suspect if we go there we'll find our answers." Leo said.

"I believe in this case it is prudent that I accompany you as well." Splinter stated.

Leo looked at Karai. "Your first mission as part of the home team." He said amused.

Karai laughed just a little. "Yeah, yay for me." She drawled as they headed toward the Shellraiser. As they got in Karai had to snicker a little bit at the newly renovated ice cream cone lamp that she had once joked would be the end of it if Shredder had found out about it.

As the drove the streets it was striking out eerily quiet it was outside, bar a few passing teenagers. Most assumed they would take the chance to get into trouble but it was the exact opposite as if they feared something worse was to come about soon enough.

As they drove closer to the built arboretum it seemed as if things got tenser. When they got out it was quiet, a little too quiet as Mikey might have joked. They stealthily made their way into the domed area and started to look around.

"This is ridiculous." Raph muttered. "This could be still be a wild goose chase if someone really wanted to fool us."

"I don't think so." April replied. "I can feel a lot of minds around here, but it's like listening to a TV late at night that's only got static."

"What could cause that?" Aaliyah asked.

"Mind control is the first thing that would come to mind." Donnie said.

"Snake Eyes?" Jennifer questioned them, remembering the mutant snake that had hypnotized several of the teenagers in town a week ago; including April, Casey and herself, all so he had a food source for who knew how long.

"Maybe." Leo answered. "Everyone stay on alert."

They only went on a few more feet before Donnie saw something and gasped. "Hold up guys." He said. They all turned to watch what he did. He picked up a fragment of a green egg. "Look at this."

"Didn't know eggs were green." Karai commented.

"Only in Dr. Seuss books." Casey joked. "But no green ham in sight." He looked to Karai. "I guess you never read that."

Karai shook her head. "I have no idea what you're even talking about Jones." She replied.

"Sometimes that's a good thing." Raph had to comment before he looked to Donnie. "But in this case ignorance is also a bad thing, if that is what I think it is."

"If you're thinking about the parasite egg that we found in that Kraang lab warehouse than you're right." Donnie confirmed, kind of nervous.

"What do you mean parasite egg?" Jennifer asked.

"The Kraang experimented on a form of parasitic wasp that ended up growing to be the size of large dog. It laid an egg and then stung me, causing me to brainwashed into protecting the egg. I passed that virus onto Raph and Donnie." Leo explained to all of those who had not heard the explanation before. "With massive start up from Donnie Mikey managed to make a cure for us, otherwise we would have been wasp food."

"Call me Professor Einstein in stein." Mikey gloated happily and took a bow. "Thank you."

"But I thought you killed them all." April said.

Donnie thought a moment. "Remember when Metalhead uncovered the Kraang were kidnapping mutants like Spiderbytez, Snakeweed, Slash, Rockwell and Pete?" He questioned. The other three turtles nodded. "I remember a parasite wasp being there too. And it escaped with everyone else."

"So that's what's behind of all of this then?" Karai asked. "Some wasp mutant thing."

"Good question." Leo replied. "There's no way it could have gotten to almost every adult in the city."

"Lead us to the concentration of life forms April." Splinter said to the red head. "Then we can find out the answers and we can all stop guessing." April nodded her agreement and the group continued on.

They soon found themselves right where they needed to be, though it was not a good thing. As far as they could tell they did indeed find all of the adults, but they also found them under the same influence as the turtles had and they were each tending to an egg. This included Kirby O'Neill and Mr. Jones.

"There must be hundreds of them." Casey said.

"Where did they all come from?" Donnie asked.

"And how did they even get this way?" Mikey asked.

"I think that might be the answer." Karai said as she pointed to a corner. "Is that who I think it is?"

"Afraid so." April answered.

The giant cobra demon unfurled from the corner, his tongue darting out as if tasting his surroundings. This time though he wore a helmet similar to the one that Dr. Rockwell worked to enhance his psychic powers.

"Do you think that's enhancing his hypnotic abilities?" Raph asked.

"Possibly." Donnie answered. "But it would have to do more than that to reach so many adults in the city."

"Like what?" Jennifer asked.

"A way to tap into brain wave lengths, and in this case probably the brain waves given off during REM sleep." Donnie replied.

"Huh?" Mikey asked.

"Dreams." Leo translated. "He hypnotized them in his dreams."

Some of the trees shuffled and out came a mutated wasp, but this one was different. Rather than being the size of a dog it was the size of a person. Long and gaunt, a huge stinger at the end of the tail section. This one sported small arms on either side of its body. The surprise was what came next. "Soon, soon my children will hatch." She declared, a huge surprise as the first mutant wasps did not speak at all. "They shall feast upon them and then we shall take the city."

"Yesss." Snake Eyes hissed. "Then we ssshall continue our feassst with the children of the city and then move on, to claim the world asss our playground."

"That wasp talks." Donnie gasped. "How did it evolve like that?"

"What do we expect?" Mikey asked. "From the Parasiticaqueen."

"Really? You're going to go with that?" Raph questioned him.

"Do you want to them to hear us?" Leo asked.

"Guys, I think that's bad." Aaliyah interrupted the brothers as she pointed out to the hatching area where several of the eggs were starting to move around.

"They're hatching." Donnie stated. "It's now or never guys."

"We have to be careful." Splinter reminded his young charges. "We do not know what this…Parasiticaqueen can do. But we cannot let this go on any longer."

"Then it's time." Leo agreed. "Let's get to work."

"Goongala!" Casey exclaimed as he shot a hockey puck he had dropped just moments ago straight to the face of the large wasp mutant.

"Booyakasha!" Mikey exclaimed as he jumped out with his kusarigama and slapped Snake Eyes in the face with it, knocking off his sunglasses.

"Who are you?" Parasiticaqueen hissed out at them.

"Thessse are the turtlesss that tried to ssstop me last time." Snake Eyes responded. "They thought they had me too, but I essscaped." He laughed. "And the humans' are the morssselsss I wasss trying to sssample."

"You are just disgusting." April said.

Some of the wasp eggs started to hatch and Leo called out, "We have to stop them from eating those people."

"I'm open to ideas." Raph said.

"Raphael, Jennifer, Karai, you try to stop the wasps." Splinter said. "Leonardo and Aaliyah you deal with Snake eyes. Casey, Michelangelo, and I will face off against Parasiticaqueen. Donatello and April, this place must have something they can use to stop water all of these plants. Find it and see if there is a way to use that to stop all of these eggs before they hatch." No one argued with Splinter and went off to try to do what they were instructed.

There was enough distraction for Donnie and April to sneak off. Finding the control room was simple thanks to the downloaded map of the greenhouse on his T-phone. He easily found the water sprinkler controls for keeping the plants well moisturized.

They could even see the battle as it was progressing. He didn't like how close the two human girls and Raph had to get in order to even deflect the wasps and he remembered all too well how they fought.

Parasiticaqueen seemingly magically grew two more stingers from the palms of her hands and she slashed them at Casey and Mikey. Splinter moved to attack her while she had her arms out but like lightning she brought out her original stinger and while Splinter was able to outmaneuver the direct attack it still managed to scrape his lower right arm.

Snake Eyes was dodging the attacks from both Leo and Aaliyah's bladed weapons but he found it hard to respond against the two formidable and in synch warriors.

At times like this sometimes Donnie just had to talk to himself. "Maybe I can come up with a mixture for a pesticide so that way I can kill the wasps without harming anything else too much." He mused and started to look at the chemicals available.

"I have to give you props." Karai said to Jennifer as she used her blade extended baton to get a good knick in on one of the wasps. "You're a very strong warrior, something your mild manner would bely to most people."

"Thanks, I think." Jennifer said with a small smile.

"Yeah, glad you approved." Raph added sarcastically though his older sister ignored him.

"Are you okay Sensei?" Mikey asked Splinter as he noticed the ninja master getting a bit winded.

"Yes, my son." Splinter answered, trying to ignore the poison in his bloodstream. He made a mental not to alert Donatello of that as it was different from the other wasps.

Donnie and April were very quickly working something else and Donnie was secretly glad to have another thing he admired about April to add to his list.

"You meddlesssome turtlesss are getting on my lassst nerve." Snake Eyes snapped. He coiled his tale and sent it out hard, slapping Aaliyah hard in the face and chest, sending her sprawling. He then grabbed Leo by his arms and tossed him hard into Casey.

"Incoming!" Mikey shouted as she saw the mutant cobra heading toward him.

"Hit me will you." Snake Eyes commented and slammed head first into Mikey sending him sprawling. Both mutants faced off against Splinter.

"Someone has to help him." Jennifer said, not liking the odds even for a great ninja master.

Raph looked to Karai. "Go help Splinter, we got this." He said.

Karai hesitated just a moment before doing just as the red masked turtle said.

Parasiticaqueen slashed at Splinter and he dodged it, though he felt the poison getting stronger in his veins. The moment of distraction was just enough to allow Snake Eyes to lash out and bite Splinter in the shoulder.

"Father!" Karai exclaimed as she slapped her tonto against Snake Eyes head to make him release the rat master and then kicked Parasiticaqueen before kneeling beside him. "Are you alright father?" She asked.

"I…will be fine, my daughter." Splinter assured him. "Just need to rest a moment."

"We've got you covered Splinter." Casey promised him as he slapped Snake Eyes in the face with his baseball bat.

"You know it." Mikey added as he used his kusarigama chain to trap the wasp mutant temporarily.

It seemed like it started to rain all of a sudden, and it took a moment for them to realize it was the sprinkler system that had gone off. Jennifer wrinkled her nose. "What is that?" She asked.

"It must be whatever Donnie and April cooked up." Raph speculated. "Let's hope it does the trick."

There was a sizzling sound as it hit the wasps. Parasiticaqueen let out a hiss and immediately flew into the air as if she wasn't sure what to do, but there was nowhere to run and nowhere to hide to protect her.

The eggs themselves started to melt, leaving a nice green gooey mess as the hatched wasps and Parasiticaqueen herself sizzled for at least a minute before they too fell to the ground in something similar to a fetal position before seemingly dying. This freed all of the adults who were too busy wondering what had happened to really notice the slight fight that was going on. Mr. Jones in fact moved to help a woman who had fallen to the ground, the sick mother who had only been able to get out of bed at that point because of Snake Eyes influence.

Whatever pesticide was used had no effect on Snake Eyes of course. It did however cause his helmet to smoke, the circuitry getting fried. He lashed out at Mikey and Casey and the two of them dodged his attack, only for Karai to move with lightning quick speed as she lashed out with a jump side kick that got the cobra mutant in the head hard.

"Treacherous little snake girl." Snake Eyes growled, being able to sense the serpent part of her from her mutation. "You shall pay for that."

"Not today, if at all." Karai responded as they were joined by Raph and Jennifer. Splinter stood as well too and they could hear Donnie and April coming in as well.

Snake Eyes hissed at all of them and saved his last glare for Karai before he leapt up into the air. Everyone prepared for what they assumed was an attack, but he instead dove underground and it seemed was burrowing away.

April ran over to her dad and hugged him tightly saying, "I'm so glad you're okay."

"Is everyone okay?" Donnie asked, knowing something had happened to Splinter.

"Everyone is fine." Splinter told his son.

"No." Karai responded. "Father was bitten by Snake Eyes. He might be poisoned."

"He also had the former Parasiticaqueen graze him too." Mikey added.

"I saw that." Donnie confirmed. "Let's get back to the lair so I can treat you Master."

Since there was no reason to argue it they headed out of the greenhouse toward the Shellraiser, along with April's father. That meant no one saw Parasiticaqueen as her body twitched again and her body unfurled…

Will Splinter be affected in any way by the poison? Will anyone have a difficult time getting along with Karai? If Parasiticaqueen is still alive what will her next move be? The adventure continues.


	28. Extraction

Karai: Myra doesn't own TMNT, Nickelodeon does, otherwise this would be on TV every week instead of .

After dropping April, her father, and Casey off at they went back to the lair where Donnie promptly took Splinter into his lab to make sure he was alright. Splinter of course used his healing hands meditation to speed up the poison removal process but Donnie being more of a turtle of science still insisted on an anti-venom and prescribed some rest and meditation.

Karai brewed some tea for her father to take to his room and then the rat master decided to spend some time alone.

That left seven of them to fend for themselves for the time being. Donnie retreated to his lab again. Leo ended up watching a repeat of Space Heroes, Mikey half watched with him and half read a comic book. Aaliyah also stayed in the living room but she borrowed Donnie's laptop to cruise the internet for a while. Karai sat outside the dojo underneath the tree, partly for her own meditation and partly to keep an eye out if her father needed something.

That left Raph and Jennifer with some rare privacy time. The two of them only retreated to just outside the lair where for what constituted a date after Jennifer threw together a couple of ham sandwiches for them.

"You know, if this ever gets too weird you can always bail." Raph said to the blonde.

"You mean dating a mutant turtle or facing countless unknown threats?" Jennifer teased him with a smile and then placed her hand on his arm. "I'm not going anywhere by choice." She promised.

"You have no idea how much that means to me." Raph admitted quietly to her so that his brothers could not hear him even if they were trying to eavesdrop.

"It's okay. You have no idea what it means to be accepted into this family after my own fell apart so long ago." Jennifer replied. "I think in truth it's one thing we have in common, we both know what it means to find something we thought we should never have."

"Yeah. I guess you could say that." Raph agreed.

They ate in silence for a moment until Jennifer saw Raph flinch. "Is something wrong with the sandwich?" She asked concerned.

Raph shook his head. "No, it's not the food." He answered her. "It's…something else. I feel like…like something is drilling around my head."

"Want me to get you something?" She asked him.

At that point they heard Mikey complain loudly, "Dude, will someone please turn off the drill trying to smash apart my brain?"

The two of them got up. As Raph hopped the turnstile and commented, "I don't there's a brain in that skull of yours to smash apart." Jennifer had to contend herself with walking through the turnstile.

"It does feel kind of weird." Leo said. "I mean I hear some kind of drill sound too."

"My head feels almost like I'm having a migraine." Aaliyah added her observation. "I used to get them, some of them were so bad the only way I could get rid of it was to sleep it off."

"I'm going to check with Donnie and see if he feels it." Jennifer told them. "Because honestly I'm not feeling it."

They were all interrupted by a bellowing from Splinter's room. Karai was the first one to be on her feet and her tonta raised for combat. "Father?" She called out quietly. "Are you okay?" Everyone sans Donnie was now at the doorway too.

Splinter came out of his room with his hands over his ears. "It is too loud." He murmured. "Turn it off."

"Dude, The Marker's getting to him." Mikey whispered to Raph, who promptly smacked him upside the back of his head for the stupid comment.

"Father, what's wrong?" Karai tried again.

"You don't hear it either?" Leo asked his older sister.

The kunoichi looked over at him. "Hear what?" She asked.

"We haven't checked with Donnie yet but the others are hearing something akin to a drill in their heads." Jennifer explained to Karai. "But I don't hear it either. I wondered if it was something only mutants can hear, but you can't and you are one too."

"I haven't been one as long as they have." Karai reminded the blonde. "And it seems to be affecting father more than it does them anyway."

"That's because it's ultrasonic." Came Donnie's voice from behind them. "I had a sound wave monitor going just now and it caught it. I didn't know if it was a problem here until now." He started toward Splinter.

The rat master shook his head. "Cannot…concentrate. Feel…" He never finished as he let out another bellow and then got on all fours and started to run out of the dojo.

"Father!" Karai exclaimed but was not prepared for it and couldn't even try to catch him.

Donnie was directly in his path but was likewise not expecting it. Splinter ran right into his smartest son and Donnie sprawled backwards, tripping and landing on the couch. His hand flew against the table and Leo's water spilled all over the top of his head.

"Hah." Mikey laughed.

Leo and Karai were already trying to pursue their father as Raph glared at Mikey. "Can it Mikey." He looked to Donnie. "Pick up what's left of your pride and let's go." Jennifer was nicer as she helped the purple masked turtle to his feet so they could all go after Splinter.

"Father, please." Karai called out. "Slow down. Tell us what's going on."

Splinter ran into an open part of the sewers and the others started to follow but their chase was interrupted by several laser blasts.

"It is the one's known as the turtles and the one's known as their human allies." A Kraang stated. There were over a dozen others there too as if they had been set up.

One of the Kraang hesitated a moment. "When were there five creatures known as turtles in the one's known as the thorns in our dorsal regions?" One wondered.

"What do these bubble gum things want?" Karai asked. "We don't have time for this."

"No we don't." Leo agreed. "Karai, Jennifer. Go on ahead and find Master Splinter. The five of us will stay here and deal with the Kraang and we'll catch up with you."

"Is that such a good idea?" Donnie asked as he drew his bo staff. "What if there are more Kraang around?"

"Text April and Casey and have them meet you." Leo told Jennifer as he drew his katana's. "They can track you with their T-phones and the homing chip in yours."

"Be careful you two." Raph said as he drew his sais, but his gaze lasted longer on Jennifer and both girls knew who he was really trying to watch out for. Both girls also knew who really needed it more.

Mikey drew his nunchuck's and Aaliyah drew her bunrei's. The two girls ran off to try to pursue Splinter as Jennifer sent a quick text to their other two human friends.

"Kraang, eliminate the turtles." One of the Kraang droids declared. "They must not interfere in the plan that is known as the plan."

The five turtles started toward the Kraang droids to take them down so they could catch up with their sister and their blonde friend.

"Do we even know which direction Master Splinter is going?" Jennifer asked Karai as she was following the kunoichi's lead.

"I know which direction he's going." Karai answered her as she ran just a bit ahead of Jennifer since she had been trained to do stuff like this longer than the blonde. "I can smell him…Father kind of smells like prey to me."

"Is that bad?" Jennifer asked her softly.

"Not most of the time." Karai said. "Luckily. But sometimes I hate that feeling."

Two more Kraang droids came out from out of nowhere. Karai jumped up and used her tonta to chop the first Kraang droid nearly in half and turned to deal with the other one only to find Jennifer had her baton out, blade extended, as she placed one of them in the head of the Kraang droid and the other in chest before she flipped it onto the ground, defeated. The kunoichi's respect for Raph's blonde girlfriend went up another notch.

"This can't be a coincidence." Jennifer said. "I don't know why but I have a feeling that the Kraang want Master Splinter."

Karai nodded. "I have a bad feeling you're right." She agreed.

They girls went on for just a bit longer before getting sniped at by another two Kraang droids. Karai did her best to block with her tonta. "We have to get to them and get rid of them so we can move on." She stated.

"I know." Jennifer agreed. "But how?"

Karai was about to try a few shurikens but the need for that disappeared when a flash of steel whizzed by and disarmed both of the Kraang droids. They turned to see April coming from another direction as she caught her thrown tessen. Karai took that opportunity to guarantee the Kraang droids were out of the fight and none of them even paid attention when the two Kraang that had been inside disappeared.

"About time O'Neill." Karai joked wryly.

April shrugged as if she didn't really care what the kunoichi said but the tone of her voice indicated she got the joke. "I got turned around under main street." She said with a shrug. Then she changed the subject. "What's going on?"

"Father is acting weird." Karai said. "He's hearing something that seems to be…like, driving him crazy and the other turtles can hear it too like a drill in their heads."

"He ran off and we're trying to find him but the Kraang are getting in their way." Jennifer added. "That's where the other turtles are."

"I can feel him." April started as Karai interrupted with, "I can smell him."

"Who cares how we do it." Jennifer interrupted them gently but very firmly. "Let's just go after him."

More Kraang droids came around the very corner that the girls needed and started to blast at them but was interrupted by "Goongala!" as three hockey pucks with cherry bombs duct taped to them flew by them and destroyed the Kraang droids.

"Well what are we waiting for, let's go." Casey said as he skated up to them. "Before something happens to the rat dude."

Karai gave him kind of annoyed glare but left it alone as she followed her father's scent, the other three right behind her.

After a few more minutes of travel April said, "I recognize this place."

"What?" Karai asked.

"Me too." Casey said. "This seems like the tunnel toward the subway station where the Kraang were pulling the giant space worms into our world from Dimension X to milk them for mutagen."

April shuddered a bit at the thought.

"Oh ,right." Karai said. "That was happening when Tiger Claw first showed up to work for the Foot clan." She shot April a look that was hard to interpret. "That was when I overheard Father tell everyone who I was, despite some believe that I was an evil witch."

"So you heard that, huh?" April questioned and shrugged a little. "Sorry about that." She sounded sincere but she didn't seem embarrassed in the slightest. Truth be told Karai could not really blame her for that since at that point it was easy to see why the red head would have drawn that conclusion.

"Forget about it." Karai simply responded, being almost mysterious about rather or not she was sincere about it herself.

April and Casey were right though as they found themselves in the center of the station where at one point a giant portal had been set up for the Kraathatrogon to be brought onto Earth. Instead of the portal though was a bunch of equipment. On the table was an unconscious Splinter, who had either been knocked unconscious from a Kraang laser blast or passed out from the pain. There were also another three dozen or so Kraang droids.

"I still don't see what could have caused Splinter to freak out like that." Casey said.

"I don't either." Karai verified.

"I'd like to know what they're up to." Jennifer said. "Why are the Kraang…doing whatever they're doing to Master Splinter?"

"Looks like they're copying his memories." They heard from behind them and turned to see the five turtles approaching them, they had unsurprisingly made short work of the Kraang droids that had tried to ambush them first.

"You found us." Jennifer couldn't help but be delighted to see Raph so soon.

"You guys left a nice trail for us." Raph replied with a smile.

"And you'll be happy to know the one with the hole in the face and chest was done by none other than your girlfriend." Karai said to the red masked turtle, deciding she had to brag for Jennifer just a little since she didn't think the blonde would do so on her own.

Raph nodded approvingly. "Nice." He commented which made Jennifer blush.

"Hey, that device over there." Donnie interrupted them as he never the less put one arm around April in a hug, in which she briefly laid her head on his arm with a small smile, that Casey pointedly ignored so it didn't bug him too much. "According to my T-phone app the ultra-sonic wave is emitting for it."

"So we break it we help Splinter." Aaliyah surmised and then rubbed her forehead gently. "Not to mention get rid of our own damn headaches."

Donnie nodded sympathetically. "Exactly." He confirmed.

"Great, but to actually free sensei we're going to have to get past tons of Kraang droids." Mikey noted. "That's not so good."

"We don't have a choice." Leo reminded his youngest brother sternly.

Raph pulled out a shuriken. "I'll snipe that little device from here and then we turtles charge in." He said.

Leo nodded. "Good idea. Jennifer and April, get Master Splinter and try to get him home, Karai watch their backs. Casey, keep us covered." He ordered as he looked at each human ally in turn, each of who nodded in confirmation. He then looked to Raph and gave a nod.

Raph drew back the shuriken and tossed it hard. The throwing star flew through the air with only a slight whizzing sound that before the Kraang could react cut right through the small box device that Donnie said was causing the ultra-sonic signals and destroyed it almost instantly.

"The turtles have found the location of the area where we are conducting our extraction." One of the Kraang stated before they all started to fire their lasers at the team.

The four humans dodged out of the way while Leo and Aaliyah took the lead, using their longer weapons to reflect the laser blasts, regardless of whether it was away from them or straight at the Kraang, which did happen a few times. The other three turtles followed their leader and their friend.

They dove right in and started to cut their way through the Kraang droids, Donnie having extended the blade from his staff to make his naginata while Mikey was able to whack them hard enough with his nunchuck without using his kusarigama.

"Let's go." April said to Jennifer and the two of them started to move around the area to head toward their still unconscious rat master. Karai had her tonta waiting but was finding it hard to stand still. Casey dropped some of his cherry bomb taped hockey pucks and started to hit them out toward the Kraang.

"Kraang detects inferior weaponry." One of them stated right before he got blown in half.

"Inferior that." Raph sniped as he kicked the Kraang that was inside the droid and turned to the next one.

April and Jennifer made their way over to where Splinter had been laid out. The red head used her tessen to cut Splinter free and Jennifer was able to catch him. She was able to hold onto him easily but was glad that April was going to be able to help her out momentarily; carrying dead weight was not something she was accustomed to.

April did come over and took Splinter's left arm over her own body. "Let's go." She said and the two of them started over toward Karai, who was waiting impatiently still as Casey still covered the turtles.

"Looks like they're getting away." Mikey said. "Should we book it too Leo?"

"We should destroy that device." Raph interjected as he took out a Kraang droid. "Whatever they tried to get from Master Splinter, they shouldn't be allowed to keep it."

Leo nodded in agreement. "Raph is right, let's take it out."

Before they could move to do so though their came movement from the other side of the tunnel where thankfully their friends had not gone. Emerging from the tunnel was not only even more Kraang droids but even worse off was Kraang Subprime, who laughed. "We meet again, you hideous reptile freaks." He stated.

"Didn't we already ace him, twice?" Raph asked. "What the hell is he doing back here again?

"Dude, these guys always get extra innings." Mikey pointed out sagely. The problem was in this case he actually seemed to be one hundred percent right.

"Who is that?" Aaliyah asked.

"That's Kraang Subprime." Leo answered the female turtle. "He seems to be the second in command of the Kraang army."

April too had heard his voice and frowned just a bit as she remembered being the one to lead Kraang Subprime, in the disguise of what she thought had been her best friend Irma Langston, to the lair to escape Footbots that had attacked them. In reality though it was a decoy to allow them to find the lair and begin their second invasion, the one that had almost mutated New York and had caused them to run to her family's farmhouse for a few months.

Some of them started to turn and shoot out the two girls and their unconscious sensei but Karai jumped in front of them and started to deflect the blasts aimed directly at them with her tonta. "Don't worry; I have your backs, keep going." She instructed the two girls.

Donnie could see that even more Kraang droids were right behind Kraang Subprime. "I think we're going to have to let this one go." The purple masked turtle noted

"No way." Raph said.

"No, Donnie's right." Leo replied. "We can't get through all of these Kraang droids and Kraang Subprime too." He nodded toward the exit where the girls were leaving with Splinter. "Time to go." The five of them each took out smoke bombs and dropped them.

The Kraang droids tried to blast them with their lasers despite the smoke but they didn't seem to hit anything. When the smoke cleared the turtles and their human allies were gone.

"Forget them." Kraang Subprime ordered the other Kraang. "We have what we wanted from that disgusting rat." He walked over and with the Irma like hand took out a CD and lifted it up to stare at it. "Let's hope this information was worth it."

They returned to the lair. They set Splinter on the couch so they could keep an eye on him. Aaliyah retrieved a blanket to place around Splinter. Karai sat by her father's side with Jennifer sitting just above them.

"Is there any way to know what the Kraang took from sensei?" Leo asked Donnie.

The purple masked turtle shrugged helplessly. "Until Master Splinter wakes up there is no way to know for sure." He looked over at their father. "On top of that, if they didn't take anything but simply copied it then there is no way to know at all."

"I'm sure Master Splinter knows lots of things that could be useful." Jennifer noted as she looked to the turtles. "But what could be useful to the Kraang?"

Three of the turtles looked like they were thinking about that. Mikey was too but the truth was no one expected an insight from him. "I suppose the most likely thing he would have that would even benefit the Kraang in any fashion would be is martial arts knowledge." Leo answered.

"Yeah, he knows things that he hasn't shown us yet." Raph added. He remembered when Victor Falco aka the Rat King had first tried to take control of Splinter's mind and his lesson to them about hesitation leading to vulnerability had come back to bite Falco. Then Leo had made a comment about how they were getting as good as him and Splinter had used a move that planted Leo on the ground reminding them all that everything they knew he taught them, but he had not taught them everything he knew.

When he turned around and mentioned that to them it drew a small chuckle from everyone except for Leo who gave a mock glare at his red masked brother.

"I just wish we knew when father would wake up." Karai said. "Until that happens we can't prove that he's really okay."

Leo came over and placed his hand on Karai's shoulder. "Sensei will be fine Karai. He's pulled through much tougher than this. You should know, you were the one who stopped him from drowning when Shredder tossed him into the drainage system during the invasion." Leo tried to soothe.

"If it helps any his mind is now calm." April said to her friends as she took Donnie's hand. "I think he's just resting now. He is still recovering from the poison from both Snake Eyes and Parasiticaqueen."

"So I guess now all we can do is wait." Leo said softly.

Splinter sighed softly as he opened his eyes. He sat up to look around and was immediately enveloped in a hug by Karai as she gasped, "Father."

"I am alright, my daughter." Splinter assured her softly as he hugged her back. He then reached over and took one of Jennifer's hands and gave a gentle squeeze before he looked back and smiled at the turtles, April, and Casey. "Thank you all for coming to my aid."

"We'd never leave you sensei." Raph said to him.

"Do you know what the Kraang did to you?" Mikey asked him softly.

"I am afraid not Michelangelo." Splinter answered his youngest son. "I do not believe they actually took anything from me."

"If they only copied something then, we may never know what it was." Donnie said.

"Unless the Kraang decide to use that against us." Leo reminded them all grimly.

What are the Kraang planning? What did they take or copy from Splinter? Is there some other source at work here besides the Kraang? The adventure continues on.


	29. Rats Among Mutants

Donnie: If you see it on the show then Myra doesn't own it. If you don't see in on the show it might be a different matter. But if you look at this plot it started on the show and got expanded here so that makes it more of a gray area…

Leo: It doesn't matter Donnie. Either way this is only written for entertainment and in no way is there any monetary compensation for it.

In a lab in the building of TCRI stood four containers. Each one clearly had a large oblong lifeform in in shuffling about. Around them Kraang droids were going about the task of setting up the tubes in order to infuse the life forms inside with mutagen. And on a screen against the right wall was the image of the leader of the Kraang, knowns as Kraang Prime.

Kraang Subprime came in with two Irma droids at his side. Kraang Prime looked down at the second in command. "Did you extract the needed information for the rat mutant?" Kraang Prime asked.

Kraang Subprime held up the item with the information on it in its Irma like hand. "We copied it from that filthy rat." He answered. "Just barely though before the turtles and their little human pets showed up. It had better be worth it."

A voice from the shadows replied, "Oh, it will be worth it. I guarantee it. With the knowledge copied from Splinter into them they shall have the knowledge needed to beat the turtles."

"All five of them?" Kraang Subprime questioned.

"What?" The voice in the shadows shot back.

"There were five turtles there, a female one that seemed to have shown up from out of nowhere since they ruined the second invasion plans." Kraang Subprime reported.

"This was not anticipated." Kraang Prime stated. "We should consider aborting this mission."

"That will not be necessary." The voice said. "We can make it work even if there is an extra turtle to contend with. Besides, we already have to contend with their two human allies."

"Four." Kraang Subprime interrupted. "There was this blonde human and it appears the daughter of the Shredder has found her way on their side."

"Then we'll deal with them too." The voice replied. "Our new warriors will know things that none of them could possibly know. The small numbers advantage won't matter."

"If there is one at all." Kraang Subprime added. "We can make sure which one of us have the numbers advantage anyway."

"Then let the mutation begin." Kraang Prime ordered.

Another Kraang walked over to the master controls and activated the pumps that traverse the mutagen into the enclosed areas.

A couple of days passed. It seemed to Splinter that it was impossible to go ten minutes without one of his students or children making sure he was doing okay, though with April and Casey it was a little less frequent since they still had to go home at night. It wasn't that he didn't appreciate the attention but at the same time he didn't really need to be babysat either.

He came out of his room and was grateful to see that his four sons, Aaliyah, April, Jennifer and Casey were currently around the TV eating pizza and watching an episode of Crognard the Barbarian. Of Karai there was no sign but he suspected his daughter was in her own room, social interactions still not being her big thing.

Jennifer had been sitting on Raph's lap with her right arm around his shoulder when she noticed the movement and turned to see him. "Hello Master Splinter." She said and the others turned to see him come out. "How are you feeling?"

"I am doing well my dear." Splinter said to her. He went to the kitchen, opened the freezer door where Ice Cream Kitty handed him a cheesesicle. He patted her on the head gently and then closed the door only to see Karai there now. "You move very stealthily, my daughter."

"The one thing I can give Shredder credit for was making sure I was well trained." Karai noted. "Too bad he screwed the rest of our lives up."

Splinter nodded a little. "We cannot change the past my daughter, all we can do is live in the now." He chided her gently. He went back into the living room with Karai. "What have you done to determine what the Kraang took from my mind?"

Donnie was the first to answer. "To be honest we're not really sure what to do to find out what they did." He replied cautiously. "The Kraang pretty much destroyed the equipment that they used to do that when they were trying to stop us."

"Is there no way to salvage it or to bypass the damage?" Splinter asked.

In truth Donnie had not really thought about. Between worrying about Splinter and enjoying the fact he finally had a relationship with April it hadn't been high on his thoughts. "I'd have to take a look at their equipment and see." He answered.

"I think we should go and take a look at that then." Karai said. "If we can figure that out we might be able to predict the Kraang's next move."

Leo nodded. "You're right Karai." He said and looked to his brothers. "Let's go then and see what we can find, April, Aaliyah you should come with us too."

"I'm coming too." Karai said.

Leo shook his head. "No Karai. You, Casey, and Jennifer stay here with Master Splinter." He said.

"I do not need to be guarded Leonardo." Splinter reminded his eldest son sternly.

"Of course not." Leo agreed, perhaps a bit too hastily which kind of contradicted his own words. "But this is a simple reconnaissance mission and considering we had a couple different things fine the lair in the last couple weeks its better safe than sorry."

Jennifer nodded a little. "I'm sorry sensei, but Leo is right. If there's any chance my father finds a way back from where Renet sent him he will come looking for us and he knows where the lair is. And if Hector survived the Dark Oni might remember from when Yen brought him here." She replied.

"Perhaps." Splinter allowed though he had his doubts. "Very well, make it so."

The four turtles and April got up, with Jennifer moving over onto the couch so that her red masked boyfriend could get up as well, and headed toward the Party Wagon as Casey stretched and looked at Karai. "I guess it's down to us now sweetheart." He said.

Karai snickered. "Sweetheart?" She questioned with a shake of her head. "That has to be the lamest attempt at picking up I have ever heard." She walked over to the punching bag they had set up to throw a few rounds.

Jennifer smiled and laughed a little. "That was classic Jones." She teased. "No wonder April chose Donnie."

The vigilante gave out a good natured huff and then reached for another piece of pizza as he went back to watching TV.

In the Party Wagon the drive to the location wasn't that long. They parked just outside and headed into the area where they had done the copy or extraction or whatever. Donnie and April knelt down to take a look at it while the other four turtles kept an eye out for trouble.

"You want some help?" Mikey called out to Donnie. "When it comes to Kraang stuff I am the Dimension X genius."

"We've got it Mikey." The purple masked turtle replied with an eye roll.

Personally Raph figured that his youngest brother liked to rub in the fact that he was actually really smart somewhere, especially to Donnie who otherwise was the resident genius of the group.

Of course Aaliyah didn't know that. "Dimension X genius?" She asked.

"Dimension X's laws of physics works differently than the ones here on Earth do." Leo explained to the female turtle in the white mask as he kept one eye out for trouble. "Plus time passes differently. Months there is like a day here."

"That's interesting." Aaliyah admitted. "Not sure I'd want to visit there though."

"Hope you never have to." Raph said to her. "Everything there also wanted us dead."

"Definitely wouldn't want to live there then." Aaliyah decided as she started to look around a little. Raph swore he saw his other brother staring at her just a little bit before returning his focus to watching for trouble.

Distracted or not, Leo was the first to hear the sound of footsteps. "I hear something." He said to his team mates. "Weapons at the ready." Everyone except for Donnie and April drew their weapons as now they could hear the footsteps now.

The last thing they really expected to see where four mutant rats emerge from the tunnel.

Splinter had retired to the dojo to train. He could hear Karai punching the bag as if she were releasing some sort of pent up frustration. Perhaps she was since he knew his daughter didn't like to be left out of anything, even if it wasn't more than a reconnaissance mission. He knew Jennifer and Casey were by the TV, though rather the petite blonde was actually watching TV or not was another matter. He had noticed that on her own she preferred to read.

Then he felt an odd sensation and gasped. Moments later both girls had come into the dojo with Karai questioning, "Father?" and Jennifer with, "Master?"

"No." He said to himself. "He was right." He looked to the two teen girls. "The Rat King is back."

"We meet again, vile turtles." Rat King said as he came up from behind the four rat mutants. "And April O'Neil. I guess I was wrong when I told Donatello he didn't have a chance with you."

"Falco." April looked up at her name and saw him. "What have you done?"

"I've taken this to our next level." Rat King answered her.

"Who is this?" Aaliyah asked.

"His name was Victor Falco. He mutated Dr. Rockwell into what he is now so he could gain psychic powers but it turned him into what he is now, the Rat King." Leo explained.

"Lame name." Mikey fake coughed and got smacked by Raph.

"Surely you remember my pets." He gestured to the rats. "Caligula. Nero. Commodus. Claudius." He introduced. "My partners the Kraang were more than happy to fully mutate my rat army for me."

Commodus glared at Mikey and mocked. "Smell the cheese turtle, smell the cheese."

"Um, my bad." Mikey tried with a shrug. He only got glared at.

"So you managed to get some real mutants." Raph said to Rat King. "Good for you, but that still won't help you against us."

"Oh, we shall see about that." Rat King said with a laugh and then pointed at the turtles. "Attack."

"Remember we have to cover Donnie and April so they can delve into the Kraang machine and find out what they wanted with Master Splinter." Leo reminded his two younger brothers and Aaliyah as the mutants rats came closer.

"At least they don't have any weapons." Mikey pointed out, trying to find a bright spot in this weird new situation.

As if waiting for that comment they each drew weapons. Caligula had a sword, a large broad sword to be precise that Leo was sure no one he knew except Slash and Leatherhead could have held one handed, but this rat mutant was doing just that despite not being bigger than him. He suspected it had to do with the fact he was, as Mikey would put it, double mutated or something like that.

Nero took out a scythe like weapon much like Aaliyah's but with a flick of a button on the side it became the same size as a bo staff. It now seemed like the scythe most people associated with the tradition image of the Grim Reaper.

Claudius pulled out two objects like Raph's sais but the middle blade was jagged like a zigzag line instead of straight like the red masked turtle's weapons.

Commodus took out a weapon where one end looked like Mikey's nunchuck but on the other end was not a place to hold but instead had a spiked mace on the chain, similar to Slash's mace but was smaller.

"You and your big mouth." Raph noted with a glare at his orange masked younger brother. "It's a good thing I can't take the time to punch you."

Then the mutant rats attacked. Leo had to use both katana to block a downward slash from the broad sword and even then it took all of his strength to make that block work. Raph had to dodge a stab attempt from the psycho looking sais. Aaliyah had to get on one knee to block the scythe coming at her with her two bunrei's. Mikey's nunchuck's briefly got tangled up against the chained mace before he and his weapons were tossed to the side.

"This isn't going well Donnie." April noted. "We have to do something to help them."

"I know, but we need to find out what the Kraang were doing with Master Splinter." Donnie reminded his red headed girlfriend. "They're going to have to hold the fort a little longer."

Leo tried to sweep kick Caligula but the rat jumped up and over him, landing behind him and delivering a kick to the back of Leo's right knee, which had been injured during Shredder's attack during the second Kraang invasion. Leo flinched just a bit and fell to the ground, though he was quick enough to dodge a follow through with a fist.

Raph moved to deliver a knee to Claudius's face but he brought up his weapon to block it, leaving a nasty scratch on his knee. When the red masked turtle landed on the ground he let out a, "Damn it." From the sharp stinging. The area was cut up and blood was coming from the wound.

Mikey rose up and tried to deliver a swinging high kick at Commodus but he used the chain of his weapon by wrapping it around Mikey's shin and tossing him to the ground hard. "Take the ground, take the ground." He mocked the orange masked turtle.

Nero tried again to swing at Aaliyah and she barely dodged the incoming razor sharp scythe. She set her hands on the ground and shot a kick out at the rat mutant's gut. He saw it coming in enough time to dodge it but wasn't quick enough to avoid contact. It made him stumble back just a little.

April had kept her eye on the fight since there wasn't much she could do to help Donnie with his search right now. Then it dawned on her what had happened and she had sinking feeling she knew what the Kraang had wanted Splinter for. "Donnie, I think we better help your brother's and Aaliyah." She said to her boyfriend. "We don't need to worry about what the Kraang were doing now."

Donnie looked over to object but saw the look on her face and decided she knew something that he hadn't figured out yet. He stood up and drew his bo staff. "Okay, let's do it." He said.

April looked to him. "We're not going to stand a chance right now. We need to concentrate on getting out of here." She said to him.

"Hmm." Donnie murmured as he looked around. He noticed some cables lying around that were attached to something similar to hydraulic locks that in fact lead into the pipes in the sewer system. "Maybe we need to create our own smoke screen." He said to April. "Reverse whatever pressure there is in their makeshift system into the sewer pipes."

"Sounds good." April agreed. "I'm going to try to help…" She hesitated. She wasn't sure which turtle needed the most help for a couple of minutes. Raph was bleeding but the only turtle to really connect a hit was Aaliyah. She was also fairly sure that Mikey's shell might have gotten knocked loose though he was doing a decent job ignoring it. "Whoever." She finally settled in on.

"I'll make it quick." Donnie promised her.

April ran forward, making sure to ram an elbow into Claudius's back for any help it would give Leo before she slid over and tripped Commodus, so his weapon went flying as he landed hard.

"Thanks April." Mikey said.

"Are you okay?" She asked him.

Mikey nodded. "I think I will be, as soon as we get out of here." He replied.

"Donnie should be working on that right now." April promised the youngest turtle gently, and then the two of them had to dodge quickly as Commodus had recovered his spiked chain ball and tried to bring it down on one of their heads.

"Finish them off quickly my children." Rat King ordered. "That way we may move onto our next objective."

"Forget that Rat King." April countered back as she kicked a rock the size of a jug at him. He was barely able to dodge out of the way.

Leo noted with interest the rats were too intent on going after the turtles rather than worrying about Rat King. If it had been Master Splinter they would have lost their focus to help their father. The broad sword was swung again and he ducked under it and rolled to the side towards Raph.

Raph was trying to work on only one knee now and it wasn't easy. Luckily for him Nero tried to attack Aaliyah again and she moved just under his scythe blade in a matrix like move and then locked her arms around Nero's weapon arm before tossing him over her back and making him collide with Claudius.

"Your knee." Aaliyah started as she came to the red masked turtle.

"I'll be okay." Raph said. "I don't think it's that deep."

The two fallen rat mutants started to get up as the other two started to converge again. April took a deep breath and focused her thoughts. A psychic sweep swept through and knocked the four rat mutants back a few feet along with the Rat King.

It was perfect timing as that was when Donnie was able to rupture the pipe by reversing the pressure and the area swarmed with steam. It worked as the turtle's and April used that opportunity to return to the Party Wagon and get out of the area.

"Damn turtles." Caligula stated as he put his sword down.

"I thought we were prepared for them." Nero added.

"The female turtle was more of a nuisance than I was lead to believe by Kraang Subprime." Rat King allowed. "We'll need another way to deal with her. But the other three were easily matched and I suspect you will match against Donatello well."

Between Casey and Splinter they had just finished telling Jennifer and Karai about Rat King and what had happened in those encounters. "I had thought I had defeated him after his attempt to turn innocents into rat people." Splinter said. "It appears though that I was wrong."

"Do you think the turtle's and April are okay?" Jennifer asked worriedly.

"I think they'll be fine Jennifer." Karai said. "They are highly trained ninjas and can take whatever Rat King dishes out at them."

"Yeah, well that might be a problem." April said as they came in.

Jennifer looked up and saw Leo and Donnie supporting Raph despite his annoyed look and attempt to say he was fine. The blonde could see his knee was cut up a little and came over to help lead him to the couch so that the purple masked turtle could go to the lab and get his medical kit.

Splinter was up in an instant despite swaying just a little. "What happened?" He asked, his voice filled with concern.

"Rat King, again lame name," Mikey started. He had a bump on his head from being tossed to the ground hard by Commodus. "Had his own mutant son's with him, of the rattata variety."

"You mean he created his own mutant army just as he wanted." Karai clarified as Raph was placed down on the couch with Jennifer beside him.

"Army might be too broad of a term." April told the kunoichi. "I think the more accurate term would be group. They barely worked together so I can't really say they were a team."

"How did four rats beat down five turtles and nearly full on kunoichi?" Casey asked them confused.

"Because those rats are ninjas too." April responded.

"You're joking." Karai noted.

"No I'm not." April responded with a small glare. It wasn't that Karai really could know what happened but she had a feeling that the kunoichi was doubting her simply because it was her and not the turtles. "They knew how to fight well."

"They did." Leo assured Karai. "They were very well trained, somehow as well trained as we were."

"Except I got a couple hits on that Nero one, even though they didn't really seem to be that effective." Aaliyah pointed out as Donnie came out and went over to Mikey to make test him to make sure he didn't have a concussion of some sort.

"And I think I know why." April said to the female turtle. "You weren't trained by Splinter."

"What does that have to do with anything?" Mikey asked.

Splinter thought he understood what the red head was getting at. "The Kraang copied my knowledge of ninjitsu so that they could implant that knowledge into these mutant rats of Falco's." He surmised as he absent mindedly stroked his beard. "It is also reasonable to say that for the Kraang are working with Falco and they are the ones that mutated his rats."

"Why?" Mikey asked.

"Can someone smack him for me?" Raph requested with a weary sigh.

"I got your back." Casey said to his best friend as he reached over and slapped the orange masked turtle upside the back of the head.

"Thanks man." Raph said genuinely.

"Anytime dude." Casey replied with a smile.

"You two know that doesn't really help me out here, right?" Donnie inquired annoyed. Again Casey laughed a little but said nothing else.

Jennifer shook her head, not understanding how they could do that or how Mikey could put up with it. She thought though it might have to do with being boys and brothers, even if Casey was more or less an adopted one.

Leo ignored the exchange but answered his youngest brother's question. "The Kraang want us dead, Rat King wants us dead. It's a match made in Kraang heaven."

"This does present one opportunity." Splinter said as he looked to Jennifer. "I have helped you develop your fighting skills and I have helped you develop your psychic skills so that you could help April to free my daughter." He stood over her now and placed his hand on her shoulder softly. "Now I shall help train you again, to use your healing powers."

"Come again?" Karai asked, not sure she heard that right.

"Jennifer can heal." April answered. "Something else her father did to her with experiments. So far it's only been an instinct for her own body though she did once heal Raph after Hector hurt him horribly."

"I don't know how." Jennifer reminded them.

"First off, you must focus as you would with your psychic powers." Splinter said to the young blonde. "They are tied to your emotions, more importantly I believe tied to your positive feelings."

"Make sense since you looove Raph." Casey jokingly mocked.

"Hush." April reprimanded him softly.

"If my hunch is right, in time Jennifer will be able to heal anyone she cares about regardless of their status with her." Splinter said to them all sternly. "Imagine a wave of blue light, flowing from your body. Imagine directing that down your arm, into your hand and into Raphael's knee. Imagine his skin as it was this morning." He directed her.

Jennifer took a deep breath, placed her hand on Raph's knee and closed her eyes, imagining exactly what Master Splinter told her to do. She found she could almost picture it all and she almost swore there was a tingling in her hand. Then she heard Raph mutter, "Awesome." She opened her eyes to see that she had done it. She had healed Raph's knee.

"Great job sweetie." Raph said as he gave her a hug and kissed her on the cheek softly.

"Well done, my dear." Splinter praised as he gently squeezed her shoulder.

"Now that is something to see." Karai agreed.

"That's the first time any of us have actually seen that." April replied. "No one was there when she healed Raph, no one even knew she had until he showed up to help us with Hector. And that glowing show isn't seen when her body does that if its own accord."

"Fortuitous as this may have been, we are left with other more lethal problems." Splinter reminded them all.

How will the team stop the rat mutants? How will the team defeat the Rat King? What will the Kraang do next to see this plan work? The adventure continues.


	30. Dockwork

Raph: TMNT belongs to Nickelodeon. If it's seen on the show then it's already owned.

Unknown to the turtle team The Kraang weren't the only ones who were working on new mutants for an army. Down in the lab Shredder stood by as Stockman sorted through DNA. He then looked toward the evil master ninja. "If we intend to make more mutantsss we will need more mutagen." He reported.

"Luckily that isn't a problem." Shredder replied. "After the turtles mysteriously got away from my herald's mystic blast we had a visitor return to the roof of that fight. Since he now had nowhere to offer, seeing what he could do, I made him an offer he couldn't refuse."

A door opened and in walked the mutant rhino Ivan Streanko, the double mutated canine Chris Bradford and the genetically modified newest member of the Foot clan, Hector, who was currently looking like his normal human form. Each of them brought in canisters of mutagen that the chameleon mutant acquired when Fulcanelli was around.

"Foot bots are currently unloading the other things of mutagen from the van we brought them in." Hector reported. "I have heard from Tiger Claw. He is acquiring more possible ideas to expand our army. Xever and Zeck are going through the recruit lists so that we may proceed with the next phase of the plan."

"Excellent." Shredder commented. "As soon as we are ready we will proceed with the plan. Meanwhile Hun and the Purple Dragons are at the docks. They are ready to receive the last weapons shipment from the clan headquarters in Asia before our relocation."

"What if the turtlesss ssshow up massster?" The mutant fly asked.

"The heralds are more than ready to stop them." Shredder reported. "No doubt that Karai has told, or will tell them, about it but unfortunately there are only so many places that we can conduct our shipping requirements."

"Man, it's been three days and my head still kind of hurts." Mikey said as he leaned back and took a drink of his soda. "That Commodus guy hits hard."

"They all hit pretty hard if you ask me." Raph stated as he swung at the punching bag in the living area. "If it weren't for Jennifer I'd probably only now be limping around instead of in fighting shape."

"Ditto that." Leo agreed as he sat on the floor reading a Space Heroes comic. "Caligula hit me hard enough that it was hours before my leg stopped feeling like it was trying to kill me." He sighed just a little. "Proof that even though I'm healed from the assault of Shredder and his gang that it'll come back to stab me when I least expect, or need it."

"Dude, I hear that." Casey said from his position playing the pinball machine. "I broke my arm in third grade and I can still feel it sometimes. Especially after a beating. Hell, I had that problem when Karai poisoned me."

"You're never going to let me forget that are you Jones?" Karai asked from her position on the couch as she read one of her father's kata books. There was a smirk in her eyes though that belied the true reason she was sure Casey remembered it.

Casey laughed and smiled at her. "Yep, talk about leaving an impression." He said.

April frowned just a little bit at the exchange. She was starting to think she had missed something but she wasn't sure she even wanted to know. She turned back to look at her current Go Fish opponent Jennifer, Raph's blonde girlfriend. "Any fours?" She asked.

Jennifer shook her head, her blonde hair bouncing a bit off of her shoulders. The red head always wondered how she kept her hair looking so full of life when she spent most of her time in the sewers. "Nope, go fish."

"I could go for a fish taco right now." Mikey remarked.

"Dude, that is just so wrong." Casey replied.

Donnie came out of the lab with an armful of T-phones. "Alright guys, I expanded the memory on each of the phones and updated the tracking app so that as long as the phone is present vitals can be monitored." He reported.

"What a joy." Raph said sarcastically.

"What vitamins?" Mikey asked confused and that got an irritated look from his purple masked brother.

"VITALS, Mikey." Donnie embellished. "As in heart rate, pulse, respiration. That kind of stuff."

"What's the point to that?" Karai asked her smartest brother.

"Probably a relatively minimally used function." Donnie agreed with a nod. "But after Hector's vicious attack on Raph I figure it's best to be able to track one of us and to have an idea how quickly we need to get to their location." He started to pass the T-phones back to them.

"Are you going to upgrade the Mutanimals phones?" Aaliyah asked from her position by the water that streamed through a part of the lair. She had been staring at it for a few minutes now and they were all starting to wonder if something was bothering her. Of course her other interest in that was personal since the girl she had come to know while 'working' for Fulcanelli, the axolotl girl Candy, had joined the Mutanimal team.

"Tomorrow I'll head over to their lair and help Dr. Rockwell with the upgrades." Donnie answered the female turtle. "You're more than welcome to come along."

"I probably will." Aaliyah said.

"Maybe we could make an outing of sorts out of it." Jennifer suggested.

Leo nodded. "Not a bad idea Jennifer." He agreed.

Raph again took a swing at the punching bag. "You know, I could really go for a real fight right now." He stated, wanting to get in a fight where they didn't get beaten or injured.

"If you really want to get into a fight," Karai sad. "I think Shredder has some weapons shipments coming in. At least he used to back when I was second in command of the Foot."

"Um, wouldn't he have changed up his stuff now that you're here?" Mikey asked his older sister. It was indeed a reasonable question.

"Possibly." Karai agreed. "On the other hand, given the wind down of the gang war there is the possibility he hasn't had the chance to change his procedures yet."

"Is it wise to go looking to pick a fight with the Foot?" Jennifer asked dubiously. "Especially with Rat King and his own ninjas out there?"

Splinter was amazed and proud that Jennifer felt confident enough around most of the team now to voice her reservations about such a thing. He knew that a month ago she never would have said anything.

"I agree it wouldn't be the brightest thing to do." Leo conceded. "But the last thing we need is to let Shredder and the Foot gain any other advantages."

"Then proceed carefully." Splinter told them all. "Do not hesitate to call myself or the Mutanimals if you need backup."

"Should someone here stay with you father?" Karai asked

Splinter shook his head. "No." he answered. "If Jennifer's fear about the Rat King and his ninja showing up are true I would rather have you all there to back them up."

"I hate to say it Karai." Donnie said as he looked to his older sister. "But this might be an instance where it's a good thing that Shredder trained you rather than Master Splinter."

"He's right." Aaliyah agreed. "They weren't as ready for me because of the fact I was trained elsewhere as well." She looked to Casey. "He's also not trained to fight by Splinter and that will help too."

"April or Jennifer could stay. Or both." Karai pointed out. April knew this was fear for her father talking and not any insult to their skills, even though truth be told she knew the kunoichi was more skilled than either she or her blonde friend were.

"No." Splinter said to Karai gently. "If things were to get too dangerous, you all might need their psychic powers to assist you, as we have many times recently."

Karai sighed a bit but nodded in understanding. "Alright, but I think the same things should for you father. If you need help call the Mutanimals, they live minutes away." She insisted.

The rat master nodded. "I promise I will do so if the need arises, my daughter." He replied and placed his hand gently on her shoulder. "Now go, show your brothers and friends the way. And be careful."

Hun had his arms crossed as he stood by the docks waiting for Master Shredder's shipments. He had each of the others placed around the docks as well, each within eye distance of each other to minimize any chance of a sneak attack. Unlike the others he also knew that the heralds were lying in wait as well in case the turtles and their allies showed up. In fact he could already see the boat with the shipment in the distance.

"Is the area clear?" Hun asked the shadows.

The shadows, in the voice of the fire herald, responded. "Your dragons have…insisted that any of the late night workers remove themselves to the premises. They will call the police but they should not show up before we are done here."

"And what of the turtles and their allies?" Hun asked.

"They have not been spotted." The fire herald answered. "However do not underestimate that. They are trained ninjas."

"Man, all this so that they can have more weapons that the turtles will still get by." Sid commented. "Must have more cash than they know what to do with."

"Heard they were going to make some more mutants." Fong said.

"Like freaks are the answers to freaks." Tsoi muttered. "That hasn't helped them so far."

"That is enough." Hun interrupted them. "Unless of course you would like to volunteer to become said freaks." That drew them all silent.

Just outside what Donnie estimated was the dragon's field of vision he; along with Karai, Raph and Mikey, where slipping an arrow with the tip coated in sleeping agent into their bows. Leo stood by with is right arm raised and ready to give the word on when to fire at the dragons. Aaliyah and their four human friends waited.

"This is going to be too easy." Mikey whispered somewhat loudly.

"Don't underestimate anything." Karai cautioned. "There has to be more of Shredder's forces here than what we're seeing."

"One step at a time." Leo reminded them all quietly. "First things first, we take out what we can see and that's the dragons." He then lowered his arm and his sibling each shot an arrow aimed at the Purple Dragons. Donnie, Karai and Raph's arrows connected and put Sid, Fong, and Tsoi down.

At the last moment Hun reached out and caught the arrow in the middle just in inches from his right arm. He looked and said, "We have company."

"Yeah, 'we' nothing." Raph said as they all dropped their bows and drew their primary weapons. "Looks like it's you against all of us."

Hun laughed. "Appearances can be deceiving my reptilian friend." He answered and as he took a fighting stance and motioned for an attack he was joined by the forming heralds. In seconds the fire, water, metal, earth and wind heralds stood ready as well.

"That's just great." Donnie said. "More trouble."

"Casey, Karai. You two handle Hun." Leo said to them and then looked at April, Jennifer, Aaliyah and his brothers. "We need to take care of the heralds."

"I think I have a plan to get us on the way for that Leo." Donnie said to him. "But you guys will have to follow my lead."

Leo nodded at his smartest brother. "Let's do it." He decided.

Casey and Karai separated from the group in order to deal with Hun while the turtles and the two girls headed toward the mystic heralds.

"April, Jennifer I need you two to keep the metal one busy for a moment." Donnie said to the two girls.

"We're on it." April said to him with a small smile on her pretty face and the purple masked turtle blushed for a moment.

"Focus, man." Raph stated to his younger brother. "If I can keep it around Jennifer you can keep it with April."

He shot his oldest brother a small glare but continued on. "Guys, we need to gang up on the wind herald." He said.

"Dude, the other three aren't going to just ignore us." Mikey pointed out, choosing not to ask what happens if the two girls couldn't keep the metal herald away.

"I'm counting on that." Donnie replied as they all turned toward the wind herald.

"Looking to get blown away turtles?" The wind herald questioned.

Just as Donnie expected the fire, water, and earth heralds were also coming up around the turtles. The purple masked turtle kept an eye out and saw the earth herald fling a huge mud bomb toward Aaliyah. "Aaliyah, watch out." He called.

The white masked female turned around and saw what was coming her way. She dropped the bunrei in her right hand and took a piece of sheet metal that had been there, she could only assume it was needed for a ship repair or had just been removed because of it. It didn't matter as she held it up at a forty five degree angle so that the mud bomb went over her and hit the wind herald.

"Hey, watch it." The wind herald snapped at his companion.

"That's not my fault." Earth herald snapped back.

"Would you both just shut it?" The water mystic demanded at them both before turning a turret of water loose under Aaliyah and making her slip to the dock hard.

The sheet metal went flying but Leo thought he had caught onto what his purple masked genius brother was planning. He sheathed his katana's and caught the sheet metal. "Come on liquid brains, try to drown me." He taunted.

"You really think that's intimidating?" The water herald questioned but still shot at the blue masked turtle just to shut him up. Leo instead brought the sheet metal up at a right angle to douse the wind herald.

"Really?" it questioned incredulously.

"At least it kind of cleaned up the mud." The water herald commented with a smirk.

"That's what you think." Donnie said. "You take mud, water and the cold…."

"It's a nice night out though bro." Mikey pointed out, and the purple masked turtle shook his head a bit.

"Yeah, let me take care of that. It's something I made in my spare time." He announced before taking out a capsule similar to the smoke bomb and tossing it at the wind herald. It released a cloud of liquid nitrogen and froze the wind herald.

"That's cold." Raph taunted before delivering a round house kick that smashed the herald into pieces. "Think that's the end of that one?" He asked.

"Don't know, but I doubt we should bet on it." Donnie answered.

"Clever, clever." The fire herald said mockingly. "Let's see what you can do about this." With that he started to let a stream of fire loose on Donnie.

Aaliyah reached up from the ground and swiped the sheet metal from Leo. "Sorry." She said to him quickly and then used the sheet metal to splash some of the water the water herald had tripped her up to splash at the fire herald. It didn't stop the attack but it was enough to distract it and ensured Donnie could dodge the attack.

Raph had made his way over to the two girls. "Hey Jennifer, can you and April give that fire guy a little bit of a bath." He requested.

"I don't think we can influence something that huge." Jennifer said dubiously.

April looked to Raph. "She's right; we can't make the ocean attack it." She looked to Jennifer now with a smile. "But I think if we focus hard enough like we did with that worm that was controlling Karai; we can make the fire herald take a bath."

"Do what you can." Raph said to the two girls. "I'll keep metal boy busy."

Aaliyah looked to Leo. "Let's see if we can make earth man all soggy." She suggested.

Leo looked lost for just a second before remembering how well they seemed to pull of double team attacks. "I think we can arrange that." He decided.

Together the blue masked leader and the white masked female leapt up and delivered two jump kicks to the earth herald and he fell back. Leo made sure to land first and hooked his hands together for Aaliyah to place one foot on his arms and he tossed her up again. She pulled off a flip and hooked both of her legs around the herald's neck and used the momentum of the spin to send the herald flying downwards. Leo moved in with a lethal one two punch that caused the earth herald to splash right into the ocean, where he did not resurface as if it had just turned the earth into mud.

That would not be the only time the ocean was used to aid the team. The girls did their best to focus on the fire herald and while they were not able to budge him both girls had the same alternative thoughts. They ended up turning the nearby containers straight at him instead. He was able to take out a couple of the smaller objects but quickly got overwhelmed by the numbers and a nearby wrecking ball slammed right into him and sent him rapidly flying into the ocean where he seemed to sizzle out of existence.

"Looks like you're running out of allies now." Mikey mocked the water and metal mystics as the five turtles moved to converge on them. Donnie and Raph made sure to stand in front of their worn out girlfriends.

While that had been going on Karai and Hun were going in blow for blow, leaving Casey just a bit startled. Not that he was complaining much as Karai was something to behold in his opinion, as agile and strong as she was beautiful.

Casey moved in and with lightning fast reflexes shot his hockey stick under the dragon leader' shins and tripped him to the ground. "That's two minutes for sticking, buddy. Goongala." He stated.

"Goongala?" Karai asked amused. "Combine that with Mikey's Booyakasha and you just have a confusing mix of testosterone, huh?"

Casey laughed and shrugged. "Whatever gets them running Karai." He replied.

"No is running hockey boy." Hun interrupted as he kicked Casey in the face and then swung a punch at Karai. She barely dodged it and he followed up with a one two punch that Karai was able to block but she didn't move fast enough to avoid the knee to her stomach. He then lifted her up by the neck.

"I'm warning you, you better let me go." Karai threatened.

"I don't fear you girl." Hun said. "I know all about you and what you can do, courtesy of your father."

"Shredder is not my father." Karai spat out.

Casey came out from behind, slamming his hockey stick onto the arm holding Hun to force him to drop Karai. Then with a cry of, "Four!" he swung the hockey stick and slapped Hun hard, where he was sent back hard enough to fall back into the ocean.

Karai looked up to see Casey smiling down at her. "Who's your daddy?" Casey joked with a broad grin. He offered his hand to help her up.

Karai hesitated for a moment before she accepted the hand up. "Certainly not you Jones." The kunoichi replied and then leaned in just a bit closer. "But in your case that might work out better for you." The comment made Casey blush just a little. He did like the fact she was a bit more forward than his red headed crush was.

The turtles maneuvered themselves so that they were in between the water and metal heralds. "So what do you think you've got on us now?" Raph asked the two heralds with a gleam in his eyes.

"We can still take all of you turtles out right now." The water herald responded. "Even turtles can drown in the right circumstances." With that he started to shoot out water bursts at the turtles which they then proceeded to dodge.

"So what's the plan now Donnie?" Raph questioned as he moved under a water burst.

"Start running further away from the docks." Donnie answered Raph. "Follow me guys."

The turtles each jumped over the metal herald and the water burst sent him against a container as the water herald followed after the turtles. They ran until they reached some of the better lit areas. "Now let's give him the shock of a lifetime." Donnie said.

"I hear you Donnie." Leo said as he drew his katana. He started to fall back from the others and as his younger brother and Aaliyah ran past the nearest lamp post Leo stopped and used his katana swords to slice it down. Raph turned and threw a shuriken at the top of the lamppost and broke the glass surrounding it just as the water herald came at them. Instead he ran head first into the exposed lights and received a large burst of electricity that resulted in the herald turning into mist.

"Dudes, we're alone." Mikey called out. They turned to see their four human companions approaching them but of the metal herald there was no sign.

"Did we stop the Foot from getting their weapons?" Donnie asked.

Karai looked around and saw the boat still right where it was. "I think they saw some of what happened." The kunoichi replied. "They won't come near this dock as long as they think there's a chance we're still here."

"Let's make them doubt then." Leo said. "Take out the street lights." A few shuriken's did just that and soon the dock was enveloped in darkness. In a matter of moments the boat turned around and started out toward sea again.

"Come on team, let's go home." Leo declared.

What they didn't realize was that Tiger Claw had taken Footbots and a sub onto the boat in order to collect the weapons. The Footbots were just loading up the last of the weapons from the boat and were waiting for Steranko and Bradford to show up with the truck when he heard a rustling sound. The mutant tiger followed the sound and found a dock worker shuffling through the weapons. He didn't seem to disturbed to find the weapons and instead looked as if he were trying to find the most valuable item in the container.

"I hope you found what you were looking for." Tiger Claw stated, making the man jump. He turned around and gasped at what he was looking at. "I hope it was worth it." With that the tiger mutant punched the man in the jaw hard and he fell to the ground unconscious. Two Footbots appeared and lifted the man up. "Master Shredder will decide this fool's fate." He declared.

Shredder waited in the throne room when Zeck and Xever came in. "We have narrowed our search down Master." Xever said as he bowed on one knee to the ninja master. "He is a bounty hunter himself but he also possesses martial arts knowledge."

"So he is worthy." Shredder assumed. "And the other?"

"He is a martial arts expert as well." Xever answered. "He speaks little but he hits hard."

"Excellent." Shredder said. "Do they know they are to be mutated?"

"I don't think they know exactly what that means." Zeck said, perhaps a little bitterly. He and Streanko were not given the choice about being mutated or what they wished to mutate into.

"They will know soon though." Zeck said.

The metal herald appeared in front of Shredder. "Tiger Claw got the weapons, but the turtles and their allies proved resourceful." He told him. "They have defeated the other heralds."

"Soon that will not matter." Shredder decided. "Soon we shall be ready to strike."

Splinter could see upon the youth's arrival they had managed to relieve some of their stress. "I take it your mission was successful." He ventured.

"Oh, yeah!" Mikey declared happily. "No weapons for the shred-dude and we even managed to get rid of those heralds."

"Except for the metal one." Donnie pointed out.

"I am glad that you were able to rid us of one threat." Splinter said. "Because we must now figure out what to do to stop the Rat King before he strikes again."

Are the heralds gone? What kind of mutants does the Shredder have planned? What fate awaits the discovered dock worker? Is this going to cause a problem with the Rat King or will the two opposing forces unite against the turtles? The adventure continues.


	31. My Attack of the Mega Shredder

Leo: This one takes place during Attack of the Mega Shredder, so aside from Hector, Jennifer and Aaliyah everything here is owned by Nick. Be warned though this chapter will contain spoilers if you haven't seen the episode.

Mikey: (waves his finger and says scarily) You've been warned….

Raph: (smacks Mikey upside the head) Don't be an idiot.

Even though Karai had been freed thanks to April and Jennifer's combined psychic powers it was still agreed that the mind control worms were a threat. To that end getting into Shredder's lair was still a priority. Frontal attacks and using the Turtle Mach was more or less ruled out. Donnie's idea to infiltrate the lair with 'the mess' as Leo put it and a trash vehicle as Aaliyah thought of it didn't sit well with the female members of the team.

So while the turtles attempted a stealth frontal entrance it was decided the girls would go in via the rooftop for a two pronged entrance. April knew the way to do it from way back when, when she had spied on the Shredder to find out how they were planning on destroying the lair with only water and an extremely rare chemical.

April felt that the turtles had been ambushed by Bebop, Rocksteady, Tiger Claw and the mutant Shredder things. Meanwhile the girls found themselves up against Rahzar and Fishface. "We can handle these two clowns." Karai stated. "In fact I can handle these two morons in my sleep."

"You have one other person to worry about little girl." They heard and turned to see Hector come up onto the roof, bat wings disappearing from his back as he landed. Jennifer gasped in shock and fear.

"You're that sorcerer's henchman." Karai said.

"Hector." Jennifer whispered.

He laughed at her. "I have some lessons to teach you my darling." He said with a cruel leer at Jennifer.

For some reason the tone of his voice just made Karai boil over in anger, proving she had at least one thing in common with her red masked brother. "Fat chance, freak." Karai growled out. She looked to Aaliyah. "Let's teach this thing a lesson or two of our own." She declared.

Aaliyah drew her bunrei. "Fine with me." She decided. She looked to April and Jennifer. "Can you two handle Fishface and Rahzar?"

"We got them." April promised.

Jennifer already knew to watch out for Fishfaces's metal legs and his teeth, a personal lesson from Raph, so she ended up going butterfly knife to batons against him. Rahzar was stronger but April was quicker and that made for some interesting back and forth movements.

"So you joined the Foot clan now because Fulcanelli got sent away?" Aaliyah questioned Hector. "Somehow that seems like a downgrade if you ask me."

"Says the girl working with her enemies." Hector mocked as his right arm turned into a crab claw and tried to snap at her but the turtle girl dodged it.

"They were never my enemies." Aaliyah said. "That was Fulcanelli who decided that one. I never even asked for this but being evil was never on my list"

Karai dodged the snapping of the claw and gave Hector stiff uppercut to the jaw. He stumbled back and growled. His left hand turned into a mantis scythe and he swiped at the kunoichi with it. She blocked it and glared at him. "You know, guys like you are pathetic." She stated.

Hector laughed. "I know of you Karai." He said. "At least I am true to who I am, to who I want to be. You on the other hand tried to play both sides until the turtles proved to you it doesn't work that way. Then you couldn't even be evil."

"Shredder lied to me about who I am." Karai retorted. "He didn't deserve my loyalty."

"A real parent will let their child follow through with their wishes and desires, regardless of what they might want for them." Aaliyah said as she brought her bunrei down on Hector though she was blocked by the crab claw. The kunoichi wondered if there was more to that statement than met the eye.

"Aaliyah! Karai!" April called out. "The guys are in retreat mode." She announced as she slid under Rahzar and tripped him despite the fact he was in fact bigger than her. "We've got to go."

Jennifer used her batons to smash Fishface in the face hard and he stumbled back. "Then let's go." She declared, trying to avoid looking at Hector's direction and more importantly the nasty look he was undoubtfully giving her.

"There is no running from this." Hector threatened.

"One of the reasons Candy and I never clicked with you and your boss," Aaliyah stated. "Is that we never saw eye to eye. Let me show why I can click with the turtle team." With that she withdrew a smoke bomb and tossed it into his face, unknowingly similar to what Mikey had done below in the Shredder's lair so they could escape Tiger Claw and his minions.

Down in the dungeon area the dockworker could hear everything that had been going on and wondered what it was about and if someone was here to free him from his captivity. Needless to say that was not going to happen today. The turtle team didn't even know about him.

The girls met up with the guys and got to the lair. Jennifer sat by Raphael. She was worried about touching his bad leg and instead she was rubbing his left arm gently. She watched as April came back from the kitchen with an ice pack for Donnie's head.

Aaliyah sat on the other side of couch by Leo. She was sure their leader was not happy about the outcome of this mission. Karai stood by herself near the TV, fuming not only over the failure of the mission in itself but because Hector's attitude toward the young blonde that lived with them was still strangely nagging at her.

"Hold still Raph." April said as she then sat by him. "I think it's sprained." She started to bandage up his ankle.

"Don't worry about it April." Raph said to her and looked to Jennifer. "You can heal it, right?"

Jennifer frowned apologetically. "I'm not sure about that one. I can heal broken bones and it seems abrasions. But I don't think I can heal sprains." She stopped rubbing Raph's arm and placed her hand on his ankle but to no effect.

April suspected as much. Having bonded with Jennifer so closely over the past couple of months, both on an emotional and on a psychic level, she was starting to get an idea of what the lithe blonde could and could not do with her powers. "You're going to have to stay off your feet for a while and let it heal up." She continued on.

Splinter showed up and put a stop to any plans for revenge and any other missions until Raph healed up from his sprain. But as soon as their rat master had walked away Leo began planning a solo mission to infiltrate Shredder's lair without technology or anything of the sort.

"Hold up." Aaliyah said as she stood up now, the edges of her white mask flapping gently with the motion. "I'm all for the idea of infiltrating Shredder's HQ and getting the mind control worm thing." She turned to Leo. "But a solo mission is ridiculous."

"Yeah, remember how in horror movies the person who splits up from everyone else ends up dead." Mikey added.

"This isn't a horror movie Mikey." Leo replied to his youngest brother.

"Feels like it sometimes." Jennifer thought she should point out. "The way all of these mutants, demons , and other assorted baddies threaten our lives." She was now holding Raph's hand and trying to calm him down a little after Splinter had more or less grounded them.

"This might not be a horror movie." Aaliyah agreed. "But this is real life. And in real life if you try to handle something on your own when you don't have to it's a tremendous risk." She stood up to face off with Leo, showing the kind of stubborn streak that either he or Raph would have shown in the reverse side despite her not being at all related to the brothers. "I am going with you. I have proven that I am just as strong, just as skilled, just as capable as you are."

"I think the appropriate terminology here is anything you can do I can do." Donnie pointed out.

"It's really anything you can do I can do better." Karai emphasized as she smirked a little. "But yea h she's got a point Leo. I'd go with you for this but I have a feeling you'd veto that one. So Aaliyah is the next best alternative."

"We'd all veto that one. "Aaliyah said to the kunoichi. "Shredder would gladly capture you and brainwash you with that mind control worm of his again and that would defeat the purpose of us having freed you." She now turned to Leo again. "But I'm not under such constraints. So that's the end of it, I'm coming with you."

Leo sighed a bit but relented. "Alright fine." He said. "Here's how this is going to go down…." He started to explain his plan quietly to his team mates.

Soon after Leo, dressed as he had when they had gone on their spirit quest, met Aaliyah stealthily by the entrance. Aaliyah wasn't sure what to make of the outfit but was not in a position at that moment to say anything. They left the lair but as soon as they were in the tunnels she remarked, "Next time let me know it's a costume party and I'll dress appropriately."

Soon the two turtles found themselves across from Shredder's lair and both were watching it so intently that they didn't hear Mikey come in from behind them. "Leo. Aaliyah." He said as he reached over to tap their shoulders. Leo almost fell off the roof while Mikey had to take a step back as Aaliyah fell flat onto her shell from the surprise.

Leo tried to tell Mikey it was too dangerous but Mikey disagreed and reminded them he had caught both of the highly skilled turtles completely unaware and that he didn't care what they said, he was going to back them up. "He did get the better of us." Aaliyah replied. "And on top of it he had to have been doing that since we left the lair."

Leo wondered for instant why it was that it seemed he was only listened to like half the time. First Aaliyah and now Mikey, just today alone. He gave off a quiet sigh and then said to the two turtles. "Alright then, let's capture a brain worm." Leo declared.

The three turtles snuck in through the top and snuck by a sleeping in the water Fishface and Rahzar. The mutant dog reached up to snag Mikey, but it was only in his sleep and for a moment the orange masked turtle was held there as if he were the stuffed white bear that Aaliyah had slept with when she was younger. The incident almost made her laugh but she caught herself, remembering where they were. She and Leo helped pull Mikey out of his grip.

They snuck into the lab and found the area for the worms. "There they are." Leo said softly and the three turtles acquired one of the mind control worms.

"Now we can get out of here." Aaliyah whispered quietly.

"Watch it sucka." They heard and turned to see Bebop uncloaking with his gauntlet laser pointed right at them from behind with Rocksteady stepping up toward them. "I've been losing a lot of beauty sleep because of you turtles."

Aaliyah snickered just a bit. "Not losing much sleep then." She joked. That earned an annoyed glared from the mutant pig.

"Shredder is making us keep the eye out twenty four seven." Rocksteady clarified. "It's not fun. It's boring." The three of them temporarily surrendered and the mutant rhinoceros went from wanting to fry the turtles to instead dunking them into mutagen.

April watched Raph absentmindedly stab his sai into an empty pizza box. Jennifer sat by him while April paced and Donnie stood around. Karai stood around, practicing just a few small movements with her tonto. They were all waiting for someone before their next move.

Casey came into the lair. "Everyone can relax. Casey Jones is finally here." He announced with a small wink at Karai.

Karai snickered just a bit. "Our troubles are all over." She drawled with a small smile of her own.

"Leo, Mikey and Aaliyah are gone." April told her friend. They had not told Casey about what was going on. They had assumed the two turtles would be back by now from infiltrating Shredder's lair. On top of that Mikey had not been part of the plan and hence he should have not been missing at all.

Casey volunteered to lead the team but Raph interrupted, reminding them that they knew where they had gone. But before they could do anything else they were interrupted by Splinter. "You are going nowhere." He noticed the three missing people. "Where are Aaliyah and your brothers?" He asked.

"Well…." Karai started just a bit nervously.

"That's a good question sensei." Donnie stated as all of them did their best to look contrite.

Three turtles trapped in cage hanging over a mutagen bath sounded like a weird song to Aaliyah. But of course it wasn't just a song, that was happening right now this instant. Bebop mocked the idea of a three headed turtle and Mikey's reaction gave the female turtle the impression that the orange masked turtle had had a rather freaky vision of what that might be like.

Then Leo stated. "What, you just want to make a turtle mutant? That's boring. Why not throw more stuff in the mutagen? Create a super mutant?" Aaliyah sure hoped it was meant to lead to a distraction because otherwise she was going to be one unhappy camper.

Bebop liked the idea and wanted to throw in the small shrimp looking mutant Shredder.

Leo suggested adding more and then Mikey did what she wanted to do. "Leo, what are you doing?" he whispered questioningly.

It was then that Aaliyah saw Leo slip out something to pick the lock with. "Stalling for time." He answered.

"Good plan." Aaliyah said, though perhaps a little sarcastically.

The Rocksteady had the idea of adding in to the other two mutant Shredder creatures. Bebop took a can of sardines and tossed it into the mutagen and the three mutants were stupid enough to dive in after it. Aaliyah almost felt sorry for the apparent brain dead things.

Then they started to mutate, with the green goo splashing out of the cage. Bebop blamed Rocksteady despite it really being both their faults and they took off. She saw Leo picking the cage lock and just stood by, trying to be as calm as possible for it to happen while Mikey was understandably panicking just a little.

Leo got the lock open and the three turtles got out of the cage. "Let's go." Leo ordered them as they dashed out.

The thing emerged and the three turtles saw it. "Oh, my." Aaliyah gasped.

"It's some kind of Mega Shredder." Mikey added.

In the sewer lair the team was watching Grody to the Max. "I think I'll take both for five hundred Alex." Jennifer commented. It seemed to her to be a mish mash that could only have been done by the Kraang's mutagen, a combination of science and extra-terrestrial 'know how' that lead to one big mash up of trouble.

"Is it me or is something about that monster kind of familiar?" Casey asked.

"A little." Raph agreed.

"Looks a little like each of those mutant Shredder things that Stockman made after the Kraang had attacked." Karai commented. "I thought they were ugly beforehand."

"We've got to do something, now." Raph stated.

They all looked to Splinter who hesitated only a moment before softly replying, "Go. Find your brothers and Aaliyah. Save the city."

"Jennifer, Karai, I think you two should stay here." Donnie said. "Just in case something happens while the rest of us are out." He was primarily referring to the fact that they still had Rat King and his four mutant rats out there somewhere too. The last thing they needed was them to take advantage of the situation.

"Okay." Jennifer agreed.

"Fine." Karai relented.

They started out but Raph let out a shout of pain and Jennifer was beside her boyfriend in an instant. Then April came over. "Raph, it's your leg. Are you up for this?" She wondered.

"If I've got to walk on my hands, we're gonna take that thing down." Raph replied.

"That'd be a trick." Karai commented with a smirk. "I can go in your place if we need to Raph."

Then Donnie said, "Maybe we can use something else to help you walk."

"Like what?" Jennifer asked curiously.

Mega Shredder stomped its way through the city. "We've got to distract it away from the people." Leo said before a taxi crashed right in front of them.

"How do we do that?" Aaliyah asked. "That thing's toe is now bigger than even Slash or Leatherhead."

There only seemed to be one way. The three turtles pulled out their grappling hooks and shot them in the air. "You're going down Mega Shredder." Mikey pronounced as Leo drew one of his swords, Mikey drew one of his nunchuck and Aaliyah drew one of her bunrei. The three turtles were swinging around like Spiderman trying to use their weapons against the huge mutant but the problem was it was only a little more effective than flies bugging a horse.

Then Aaliyah turned around just in enough time to see Mega Shredder grab Mikey, take away the grappling hook, burp into his face (she swore she could smell the sardines that Bebop used to bait them in) and then seemed to eat him. "NO!" Aaliyah shouted out, thinking how devastated the rest of his family, friends, and Renet would be about this. Then he heard Leo shout out, "MIKEY!" and knew the eldest brother had seen the same thing.

Both turtles went at it again but to no avail. Aaliyah saw Leo recover Mikey's grappling gun. The two turtles tried to go at again but this time Mega Shredder snatched both of them up in one of its hands. "I do not want to be monster chow." Aaliyah declared, though perhaps uselessly.

Then Mega Shredder had something slam into it from behind it. He dropped the two turtles and as Aaliyah recovered she could see behind them standing the Turtle Mech. She had never actually seen the thing in action as they had used it against Kraang Prime during the second invasion, before she had known any of them. In it from top to bottom were Raph, Casey, April and Donnie. Of Jennifer and Karai there was no sign. It took Aaliyah a moment to remember there were other things to be ultimately concerned about than just this, and concluded they must have been with Splinter.

As Mega Shredder roared and turned to confront the Turtle Mech Leo and Aaliyah used their grappling guns to get out of the way of the huge monster, nearly avoiding being stepped on. She had seen the T-Rex step on a guy in Jurassic Park The Lost World and she had no desire to know what that felt like first hand.

As the Turtle Mech used another explosive on Mega Shredder, Leo and Aaliyah landed. Leo looked down sadly at Mikey's grappling gun. Aaliyah gently placed her hand on his shoulder. "I'm sorry about Mikey." She said softly. "I guess we should have sent him back after all."

Leo looked to the pretty turtle in the white mask. "Yeah." He echoed sadly. "I guess we should have."

The white masked turtle then noticed something she hadn't before. The Mega Shredder seemed to have the upper half of a male human torso for a tongue. It kind of reminded her of either Hun or the description she had gotten of Shredder before the fire. "Gross." She murmured as she pointed it out to Leo.

Another explosive barrel was lodged at Mega Shredder. Then they barely dodged a charging ram attack from the large creature. Then it took a moment to seemingly pay ping pong with the Turtle Mech before tossing it against a building, the one right next to where Leo and Aaliyah were standing.

It then tried to scoop up the Turtle Mech to eat it. "This thing sure has a big stomach." Aaliyah noted with some sad humor. Then someone, Aaliyah guessed Raph, activated a flamethrower and burned the thing's mouth, causing to throw and release the Turtle Mech.

The human torso looked at Mega Shredder, now hairless, and then it blew out the top of its head. That was when Donnie had his realization. "It's the tongue." He stated and the shouted out louder, "Leo, Aaliyah, the brain is the tongue!"

"We're on it." Both turtles exclaimed at the same time. They shot out with their grappling hooks. Leo used one of the grappling hooks to wrap up the tongue portion as Aaliyah came in with a swinging kick to it, sending it spinning a bit before Leo used that grapple wrapping to slam it down onto the street hard.

Both turtles dodged out of the way as the Turtle Mech used a large suctioner to slam into Mega Shredder. The tongue rose just in enough time for Aaliyah to give it a good uppercut upside the jaw and then Leo used the grappling gun to again shoot it where it hit a metal piece like a garage door. The two turtles landed on either side of the Turtle Mech's shoulders.

"Damn, how to do we stop this thing?" Aaliyah asked as Mega Shredder started to chase the Turtle Mech.

"Yeah, how do we stop this thing?" Raph questioned.

"How am I supposed to know?" Donnie responded back.

Mega Shredder used the tongue to slam into the back of the Turtle Mech. It grabbed Leo and Aaliyah got ahold of Leo's shin and the Turtle Mech in turn got a hold of Aaliyah's shin. She was glad that it didn't hurt considering it was a big grappler and she was still flesh and blood.

A brief tug of war ensued and Aaliyah heard Donnie mention something about Mikey. She was not looking forward to explaining that one. But then the largest mouth on the mutant had its teeth start to crack and then shatter, and as if he had heard his purple masked brother there was Mike who exclaimed, "Cowabunga!" the phrase he had gotten permission from their friend in the Mutanimals Mondo Gecko to say every now and again.

"Mikey, I can't believe it." Leo commented.

"You're alive." Aaliyah gasped happily and very much relieved.

With his kusarigama Mikey jumped out of the mouth and further exclaimed, "Booyakasha!" as he used the sharp part of the weapon to cut the tongue off Mega Shredder. The Turtle Mech, Leo and Aaliyah all took an awkward landing on the pavement with it.

That seemed to kill the tongue and with it seemed to cripple Mega Shredder. Raph announced, "Now's our chance to finish this thing. Fire!" The explosive barrel shot straight into its mouth and moments later made it implode. It made for a nice gooey mess.

The team let out gasps of joy and Aaliyah could hear April say, "Pretty awesome guys."

"And we even captured a brain worm." Leo stated as he looked to Aaliyah and Mikey. "Not a bad day after all."

"I think Bebop and Rocksteady might disagree when Shredder finds out what happened though." Aaliyah pointed out with a laugh.

Shedder had ordered Tiger Claw to further Zeck and Stefano's education in pain and returned to his throne. Tiger Claw complied with Zeck requesting the goggles be left alone since it was 'kind of his thing'. As he watched he muttered, "Again it is time to expand my army, hopefully into something more competent."

After securing the Turtle Mech and returning to the lair they all told Master Splinter what had happened. Splinter was not entirely pleased at what had happened but in the end it seemed like it had worked out for the better.

Karai just made a face though at the mind control worm that was being held where it had been placed by the blue masked leader. "Just keep that thing away from me." She declared, disgusted. "I've had one of those things too close to me for comfort."

"I hear that." Raph agreed with his sister.

"It was still a very foolhardy thing for you to do." Splinter noted sternly. "Raphael got injured, Michelangelo was almost eaten and sneaking into the Shredder's lair is what created the Mega Shredder, no matter how unintentional it was."

"I'm sorry master, but something had to be done." Leo said reverentially.

"Leo is right." Aaliyah agreed softly. "Just because April and Jennifer were able to free Karai doesn't mean Shredder won't stop trying. And if he infects the entire city the two of them won't have the power to save everyone."

Jennifer sat by Raphael, now holding his hand. "Just saving Karai drained me more than I like." She confessed.

Splinter sighed softly. "Let's just take this good fortune for what it appears to be." He decided. "Donatello, April. Start examining this mind control worm. Enlist Dr. Rockwell if you have too. We must know how to stop this thing once and for all." He looked to them all. "Again, you are restricted from missions until Raphael has recovered."

"Alright." Mikey declared as he stood up. "Pizza omelets or Omelets pizzas?" He asked.

Jennifer giggled, kissed Raphael on the lips softly and then stood up. "Come on Mikey." She said. "I think it's time that I teach you how to make French toast. I know we picked up the ingredients for it when we were shopping last."

"It's a good thing someone around here really knows how to cook." Leo remarked.

A/N: Well this is the first time I've ever directly incorporated my OC's into an actual episode storyline so I hope this turned out okay. It's not something I do that often really but somehow after starting to write the first fight that explained Rahzar and Fishfaces's original absence it just kind of started flowing from there. It does serve to show the turtles that Hector is in the Foot clan now. I'm also glad to see the Turtle Mech return as I wanted to use that and now I have the official return of it. Of course next time we return to the regularly scheduled original plots.


	32. A Time To

Raph: Do we even need to be doing this anymore? It's already been stated multiple times that TMNT is owned by Nickelodeon and that anything not seen on the show isn't owned by them.

Mikey: Well we do have some gray areas.

Raph: Like anyone from Nick is even paying attention to this anyway.

Leo: It still should be done. Especially since one of the villains showing up here is simply a reimagined one.

The four turtles worked over the next couple of days to increase their training to prepare for the next time they had to fight Rat King's rat mutants. April and Jennifer tried as well but it would take a while before they could even do so.

The problem was that thanks to the Kraang's extraction process those rat mutants knew everything that Splinter knew and that posed a problem for the turtles. Their only consolation was that Aaliyah started to teach them some of the katas she had learned when she had been learning ninjitsu. The problem they were discovering was that there were only a select few things the female turtle knew that the others didn't and that meant it wasn't enough of an advantage.

Raph had suggested learning somethings from Karai as she had learned from Shredder as she had grown up differently but given as several of the things Karai learned were different from what Splinter had ever taught them, Karai thought it was a bad idea and Splinter agreed with her, vetoing the idea.

"There has to be something that we can do to help our odds out." Donnie said after they had finished a third session. "I doubt this is going to be enough to stop them since they know Master Splinter knows."

"What more can we do?" Raph asked, sounding slightly exasperated since he was not happy with the idea that they couldn't learn from Karai. Granted he knew what his oldest sister had learned wasn't exactly considered on the up and up but they were in a tight situation here.

Jennifer placed her hand on Raph's shoulders. "I know it's frustrating to have a possible alternative in front of you and to have it be off limits." She said softly to her boyfriend. "But if Master Splinter didn't want to take the risk it has to be for a good reason."

Raph sighed softly "Yeah, I know. I just don't hear any other ideas and sooner or later we're going to run out of time for that." He said.

A time door appeared just above the lair and they all looked up to see Renet coming through the portal. "Oh, no. Not again." She sighed and started to plummet down to the floor. Mikey rushed over quickly and caught the apprentice time mistress in his arms but the impact caused the orange masked turtle to fall to the ground with her on top.

"Thanks." Renet said with a smile and kissed Mikey on the nose, making him blush.

"Nice of you drop in." Raph drawled as they started to come over to the youngest brother and the young apprentice.

"I think so." Mikey replied with a smile as he helped Renet stand up with him.

"Who is that?" Karai asked.

"Her name is Renet Tilley. She's an apprentice time mistress of something or another." Casey explained to the kunoichi. "They just met her and had a time travel adventure with her."

"Oh, hey." Renet said as she looked over at Karai and smiled. "You must be Hamato Miwa. April and Jennifer did succeed in freeing you."

"My name is Karai." The kunoichi corrected her uncomfortably. Despite the fact she had accepted her new original family she still didn't feel comfortable with the name that she had been told her parents had given her.

Renet looked at her oddly a moment before she shrugged. "Okay." She relented.

"Are you just here for a visit?" Jennifer asked the girl hopefully. The last thing they needed was another problem on their plates.

Renet gave a small apologetic smile as if she knew what the blonde was thinking. "I'm afraid it's not just that." She said softly. "I…kind of need your help."

"We don't have time for this." Raph said under his breath but had the grace to look kind of regretful about the comment when Jennifer gave him a disapproving look. Still he couldn't help but say, "Well we don't."

"What's going on Renet?" Leo asked the girl though he privately had to agree with his red masked brother. Rat King was already proving to be a problem, especially with his apparent alliance with the Kraang now.

"There's this little thing I looked into a few minutes ago." Renet started, referring to the same globe she had looked into when she saw Mikey dying at the hands of Fulcanelli's black burn. "Savanti Romero is back."

Karai tried not to sigh as she was starting to see a theme developing here. "Who is that?" She asked warily.

Donnie answered for her this time. "Savant's was an apprentice before Renet, but he tried to steal the time scepter she has right there," He pointed at the object in her right hand. "And Renet came to us to for help. He was supposed to be lost in time."

"It was like a ninety five percent chance." Renet said. "So there was always a small chance that he could come back."

"Seems a little hard to believe though." Donnie pointed out.

"Well see, that's the other thing." Renet said a bit shyly. "He didn't do it alone. He had some help, but I wasn't able to really get a close up view on what he looked like."

"So what are they doing then?" Jennifer asked her.

Renet shrugged. "I don't know. I lost them." She admitted.

"How did you lose them?" Raph asked dubiously.

"It's kind of hard to explain." Renet answered, again kind of shyly. "See, it's like he just showed up, collected Savanti and then disappeared. I don't mean like 'poof' disappear but through this little black portal thing."

"That's descriptive." Raph said as he rolled his eyes. Jennifer shook her head lightly at him and he shook his head a bit, surprised at how tolerant his blonde girlfriend was.

"Just out of the blue?" Donnie asked. "No remote or voice command or anything?" The apprentice time mistress shook her head and the purple masked turtle nodded. "I suspect that would mean it would either be some kind of implant that links directly to the source or a mental command of sorts."

"Fascinating." Karai murmured with a shake of her head. Casey and Raph snickered just a moment.

"I can't make you help me." Renet said firmly, and perhaps just the slightest bit annoyed. "I just thought that maybe you might want to, what with it being a cool and mysterious adventure and all, but I'll do it myself if I have too."

"I want to help you." Mikey promised her as he placed his hand on her shoulder.

"No, you're right." Leo said to the girl. "This is something we should probably be concerned about." He looked to Master Splinter. "With your permission, sensei."

"You may go." Splinter answered. He had learned long ago these things happened for a reason and he was sure if he said no that would upset Michelangelo. "Just be careful."

"Leo, I get that we should help." Raph said to him. "But with Rat King and those mutant rats of his we can't leave Splinter alone either."

"Go on then." Karai said to her brothers. "I'll stay here with father and keep him safe. Those rat mutants won't be able to take me that easily since I wasn't trained by him."

"I'll stay here too." Casey said. "Karai shouldn't have to do this alone and I don't have to be worried about them knowing my awesome move sets either."

Jennifer looked to Splinter as if asking his permission and when their rat master nodded she said. "I'm going to come with you too." She said.

April nodded. "I might regret this little fun trip but count me in too." She said.

Aaliyah looked torn too but then they all were surprised just a little as Renet turned to the female turtle and voiced, "I really think you should come along too Aaliyah. We can use all the help we can get." It was one of those moments were the girl didn't seem like a naïve young apprentice and more like a seasoned time mistress.

"Alright, count me in." Aaliyah decided.

"But how do we know where to find Savanti and his new friend if we don't know where they are?" Raph asked them.

"I'm kind of hoping I can track him with the time scepter, I just didn't want to do it alone if I could help it." Renet said. "If that doesn't work…I don't know." She admitted.

"Let's try your method first." Leo said to her. "We can go from there if it doesn't work."

"Okay then." Renet said cheerily. She opened up a time door and the group stepped through it. They found themselves in a museum.

"Where are we?" Raph asked.

Donnie glanced around. "Judging by some of the architecture we're seeing, it looks to me like we're in the Old Acropolis Museum in Athens." He answered.

"What time period is that?" Mikey asked.

"We didn't travel in time Mikey." Jennifer replied. "We traveled halfway across the world though."

"Oh, this was supposed to work." Renet mused sadly. She looked at the time scepter. "Why didn't you work, I thought we were on the same page here."

Raph repressed a small sigh of irritation knowing that Jennifer wouldn't like that too much. "So what now?" He asked.

"We should return to the lair…" Leo started to suggest but then he noticed something out of the corner of his eye, what looked to be the shadow of none other than the mutant looking demon they were looking for; Savanti Romero. "Scratch that. Looks like we weren't misled after all."

"Cold." Renet said and then looked at the scepter. "Glad we still have our understanding."

Jennifer thought it was kind of funny to see Renet talk to the scepter as if were somehow sentient. Then she remembered how she had said the turtles were destined to end up in Japan to see their father as human, as well as Tang Shen and baby Miwa and rescue their father from the building that Shredder had set on fire during his fight with Hamato Yoshi and realized maybe it was sentient somehow. "I think you mean cool." She said to the apprentice time mistress.

"Oh, yeah." Renet conceded. "My bad."

"I've seen some of the descriptions of exhibits they have here." Donnie said. "It looks to me like he's heading toward the Greek antique weaponry exhibit." He looked to April. "There are two ways there, the way we just saw him go and then one on the other side of the stairs past the next exhibit on the right."

"So we need to try to attack from two sides, especially since we don't know who the other half of this duo is." April guessed.

Leo was the one to nod. "Sounds right." He agreed. "Aaliyah, take the girls the other way around while we go behind Savanti. Watch our backs for the other one."

Aaliyah nodded. She thought it kind of neat that he trusted them to watch their backs against the unknown instead of letting them take what could be the less dangerous route. In the end though she suspected divide and conquer was only a temporary strategy anyway.

The two teams split up. It was hard for anyone that wasn't Raph, Mikey, or Renet not be kind of fascinated by what they were seeing even as they continued on. Aaliyah stopped at a painting to gaze at it. Renet turned to the female turtle to remind her they had to go but stopped as she saw some tears in the girl's eye. "Hey, are you okay Aaliyah?" She asked.

"Yes." Aaliyah answered softly. "It's just the style…I know this is like centuries older than anyone that's ever been alive today, but it's still so similar to…" She cut herself off.

 _Older than most anyone that's been alive today, though sometimes alive isn't the right word._ The thought flitted through the apprentice time mistress's mind but she caught herself shy of actually saying those words. "Similar to whom?" She asked.

"Similar to my older sisters." Aaliyah admitted. "Something I haven't told anyone here about."

"Think she would have a problem with the new you?" She asked Aaliyah quietly.

Aaliyah hesitated a moment. "Who knows? As we grew up I kind of came to discover she seemed to have so many problems with the old me. She's probably glad that I'm not around." She replied.

"I kind of doubt that." Renet said. "Not that I have siblings or anything but still…how could siblings not love each other?"

"It's not that we hate each other." Aaliyah clarified as she took Renet's arm and started to move them to catch up with April and Jennifer as if just remembering what they were supposed to be doing there in the first place. "It's just…" She wasn't sure how to explain it. "My parents spent so much time between work and supporting my talents that they completely ignored my sister's and I think she somehow decided that was my doing rather than theirs. But trying to make her realize that was so impossible."

Renet looked back and then looked to Aaliyah with sudden recognition. "Your sister is an artist." She breathed.

"She painted for a long time but my dad was very practical and was always reminding her the odds of someone making it as an artist." Aaliyah replied as they started around the stairs. April and Jennifer had already turned the corner. "My mom was even more practical and never really saw the point of art. At least I was doing something that could save lives or help people with problems someday, but that isn't what they saw from her."

Renet felt confused. "What did that have to do with you?" She asked.

"It didn't." Aaliyah responded. "But that isn't how she saw it. Probably since my parents basically didn't care the only she could try to get any sense into was me. And I did like her work, but I listened to everything our parents said. If I was told her art show at school had to be skipped so I could make my practice on time, that's what it was. I didn't argue it; I didn't…fight for her." She took a deep breath. "And so for all intents and purposes I lost her. She wouldn't come to support me and I didn't fight to support her."

"Someday you'll find a way to make it right with each other." Renet promised with a certainty that the turtle girl didn't feel as the apprentice time mistress reached out and gently touched her arm. Then they caught up with April and Jennifer.

"I see the guys just behind the corner." April told them, not asking what had taken the two of them so long. She figured eventually Aaliyah might tell them, and if she didn't at the moment it wasn't her business anyway.

"Where are Savanti and the other one?" Renet asked.

"No sign of mystery guy." Jennifer answered her silently. "But I think I see Savanti. He's over there by some swords."

Sure enough he seemed to be reaching for one of them when Leo called out, "That's far enough Savanti." He turned to see the four brothers standing there. "Drop away from the swords or face the Turtles of Justice."

Raph sighed heavily. "Again with that Turtles of Justice stuff?" he questioned.

"Nice to see you freaks again. Tell me, is the time brat here as well or did you somehow find a way to find me?" Savanti Romero asked them.

Jennifer reached over to stop Renet from showing her indignation at that insult.

"How we found out doesn't matter dude." Mikey stated as he pulled out his nunchuck. "Back away from the old weapons."

April gasped and stood up. "Donnie, guys! Behind you!" She exclaimed.

The four turtles turned just in enough time to get blasted several feet across the museum room. They got up and saw they were looking up at a what seemed to be a mutant cat, though not even Donnie could have identified the type. "Well, well. If it ain't the turtles." He said as he lowered the blaster in his right hand.

"You know us?" Mikey asked. Then he looked to his brothers. "We know him?"

"No Mikey, we don't." Raph answered with a glare at the newcomers.

"I do know you though." The strange cat mutant said. "We've tangled before."

The four girls came down to join the turtles. The new mutant hesitated just a moment as if he didn't recognize any of the girls. Then a small realization dawned on him. "Ah, you're that O'Neill girl. Younger than I thought you were supposed to be." He stated.

"Huh?" April asked, now as confused as the brothers.

"The one with the cape is the Simultaneous's apprentice." Savanti told him as he came to stand by him.

"Ah." The newcomer said. "But I don't know who the other two girls are."

"How do you even know us?" Leo asked.

"He must have access to some kind of time travel." Renet commented. "I don't know how though."

"It's true." The newcomer admitted. "I've tangled with you, in my past that is your future."

"Huh?" Mikey asked confused.

"I hate time travel." Raph reiterated again.

"So what are you doing here?" Leo wondered.

"Does it matter?" Raph questioned. He stood up and tried to attack the new mutant. He responded, not by blasting him with the blaster he had originally shot them with but with a single jab of his left hand against the turtle's chest. That sent him flying. Jennifer gasped and ran toward him.

"Wow." Mikey mused. "That was a hell of a hit from Robotcat."

"Robocat?" Aaliyah asked.

"Heh." The mutant cat laughed. "You can call me Verminator X, turtles."

"Aren't you glad that you didn't give that name to Rat King after all?" April asked the turtles as they all regrouped around Raphael, who was now standing up.

"Get the sword." Verminator told Savanti. "I'll keep the turtles occupied, and if I can kill any of them here so much the better."

"Gonna take more than a lucky shot and a blaster to get the best of us." Raph warned the mutant cat.

"I know more about that than you would expect Raphael." Verminator X responded. "In fact, I owe you."

"For what?" Raph asked. If it weren't for the fact he had just admitted he didn't know who Aaliyah or Jennifer were he would start to suspect he had someone else pissed off at him for taking a liking to the blonde.

Verminator X didn't respond to the red masked turtle's inquiry and instead from what seemed to be unseen areas they started to get blasted at by the mutant, including from the one source they could identify; the pistol in his right arm.

Savanti started again toward the swords they had caught him at in the first place. Aaliyah ran over to try to stop him but at the last second he turned and slammed his fist right into the turtle girl's jaw. She fell back hard.

Leo started to focus and use his katana to try to start knocking the blaster attacks away from them. Donnie used that to come up behind his eldest brother, used his staff for a running jump and came down with a flying kick to his chest. That sent him back and he fell hard.

That stopped wherever the other laser blasts had come from. He also lost a small remote object that flew across the room. April saw it and quickly pocketed it so that she could let Donnie see it later.

Aaliyah recovered in enough time to see Savanti pick up a sword. "Ah, this is it. This is the fabled weapon that the legend says was used to take an ultimate evil and destroy its corporeal form. And now we shall use it for our purposes." He said. "This includes me taking my rightful place as time master."

"He's got one of the swords." Aaliyah announced.

"Put it down." Leo demanded.

Verminator started over toward Savanti and the noticed that half of his shirt had been ripped off. But there wasn't fur there, in its place was metal from shoulder to arm, stopping just at the wrist with fur there.

"How is that possible?" Donnie wondered.

The mutant cat started to search for something and the cursed. "Time for plan B." He told Savanti, and a moment later a large black hole like what Renet described to them in the first place when she came to them for help opened up. The two villains stepped through it and then vanished.

"Where did they go?" Leo asked as he looked to Renet.

Renet tried to activate the time scepter and nothing happened. "Man." She whispered.

"Let me guess, your 'agreement' with the time scepter has fallen apart." Raph speculated as they all came together again.

"No." Renet answered, either not realizing Raph was being sarcastic or choosing to ignore it, which was anyone's guess. "If it does that it most likely means that wherever Savanti and Verminator went it's protected from time's eyes."

"So we have to wait for them to make the next move then." Donnie said.

"Great." Raph muttered. "Rat King has rat mutants that can kick our ass, Savanti and Verminator are doing who the hell knows what, and we still have the Foot out there too. We're doing great here people."

"Let me take you guys home." Renet said.

While that had gone on halfway around the world, Tiger Claw brought the dockworker he caught trying to steal from them up to the throne room, where Shredder sat. On either side of the dockworker was Hun of the Purple Dragons, Bradford, Xever, Hector, Streanko and Zeck. "This is the man who tried to steal from you Master Shredder." The mutant tiger declared.

Shredder glared down at him. "What audacity you must have." Shredder stated. "Tell me one good reason why I shouldn't have you killed."

"I…I was just looking for an edge in life, that's all." He told Shredder.

"You think that is going to save your life?" Xever questioned with a glare.

"I'll be more than happy to finish this dirt bag thief off for your master." Rahzar added.

Everyone was surprised to hear Shredder say, "No." When they all looked over at him he instructed, "Take him to the dungeon for now until I am ready for the next step." He looked down at the man. "I'll be more than happy to give you that edge you wanted in your life."

Somehow that was not reassuring to the man.

While Splinter had gone off to meditate had sat down and tried to watch an episode of Crognard the Barbarian since her brothers seemed to like it. She personally couldn't see why though as a child she had not grown up watching TV of any sort.

Casey came in from the kitchen where he had been making some food. He sat by Karai and to the kunoichi's surprise he handed her a bowl of ramen. "Made too much, didn't want it to go to waste." He explained to her. In truth he wanted to do something nice for her but was pretty sure if he said that she would be less inclined to accept it.

Karai took it from him. "Should be more careful about wasting food there Jones." She said. She kind of wanted it to come off as a lecture but she was smart; she knew odds were making enough for two wasn't an accident. "Luckily for you I'll be happy to take it."

The vigilante laughed a little. "Witness the relief of Casey Jones." He said.

The kunoichi looked at him a bit oddly. "Do you like referring to yourself in the third person?" She asked him.

Casey shrugged. "Sometimes, yeah." He answered. "It's a reminder to those around me how epic I can usually be."

Karai laughed a little. "You don't lack confidence, I can give you that much." She said. "Now if only I could get why my brother's like this show so much."

"It's cool." Casey said. "Though I kind of preferred Super Robo Mecha Force Team Five."

Karai shrugged a little. "Watching TV was not a pass time when I was under the Shredder's roof." She said nonchalantly. "It was pretty much all about practice and making sure you were strong enough to survive, and more importantly even thrive."

"You seemed to have done a good job with that one." Casey complimented.

Karai wasn't sure what to say to that, but was saved the response when a time door opened and April, Jennifer, Renet and the five turtles came through it. "Have a good time?" She asked them instead.

"Not really." Raph answered. "We met some time hopping flea bag named Verminator X and they stole some kind of sword from a museum in Greece."

"Why would he do that?" Casey asked. "Wouldn't a tuna factory been more in line?"

Raph and Mikey snickered at the comment as they all settled in the living room.

"Verminator dropped something during the fight." April revealed and she took out the small remote control device. "I don't know what it does but I think this is what he was looking for originally."

Donnie reached over and took it from his girlfriend. "Looks like a remote control of some sort. It seems simple enough but I think it's better to examine it and make sure of what it does and what it runs off of before we even think of trying to follow it to its source." Donnie said, more to himself than anyone else. Then he looked at April. "Want to help me analyze it?"

"Sounds fun." April said with a smile and the two headed off toward the lab.

"That showing April a good time there bro." Raph called out. Jennifer laughed just a bit but still thought it would be appropriate to elbow him a little for it.

"So I guess you're going home now, huh?" Mikey asked Renet a little disappointed.

"Well…I lied a bit when I first came in. I just happened to notice what was happening before I came here…where I was hoping to spend time with you," Renet stopped and looked around quickly at everyone else still present but ended up looking back at Mikey anyway, "I mean with all of you guys for a few days."

Mikey's face lit up like a Christmas tree. "That is so awesome." He stated. "I can most definitely work with that."

"I have to warn you though that this might be a working vacation for Mikey." Leo said to the apprentice time mistress. "We still have some problems of our own going on here, even if Savanti and Verminator have currently disappeared."

"It's fine." Renet said. "In fact, maybe somehow I can help you guys out."

"That'll be interesting." Karai noted with a smirk.

Who is Verminator? Why did he and Savanti take the sword? Could or should Aaliyah try to patch things up with her sister? What does Renet know about it? What does Shredder have planned? The adventure continues.


	33. Extreme Measures

Raph: TMNT is owned by Nickelodeon, if it's seen on the show that means it's already owned.

From his room Master Splinter could hear most of his charges engaging in their daily habits. Michelangelo and Casey Jones were playing a video game of some sorts. Leonardo and Raphael were in the middle of what one would call a heated debate about how they should handle dealing with the Rat King. The rat master was glad it wasn't a full on argument, at least not yet. Aaliyah was trying to referee the heated debate from a relatively neutral standpoint but he wasn't sure how successful that was.

Outside of the living room Splinter could hear his red masked son's blonde girlfriend Jennifer Quinn teaching their temporary house guest the apprentice time mistress Renet how to make brownies. He wasn't quite sure what kind of differences and similarities there were between the past and the future. But he also knew that even those in the present couldn't necessarily cook either. On the other side in the lab Donnie and April were talking about their recent experiences at the museum, and he highly suspected the two new love birds were at least holding hands in the process. He didn't hear Karai which said to him his daughter was probably in her own room meditating.

"Look, I'm not saying we learn what Shredder taught Karai." Raph was saying to his oldest brother and the leader of the team. "But what we know right now isn't going to stop those rat mutants of Falco's."

"What else do you think we should do then Raph?" The blue masked turtle questioned him. "I'm sorry to say that unfortunately Aaliyah doesn't know enough different things to help us with this and assuming there is even anyone out there who can do differently we can't exactly go up and ask them to train us."

"We have to stop them though somehow Leo." The red masked turtle fired back. "Staying in hiding won't stop the Rat King from doing whatever he wants to do. It'll probably only spur him on since the last time we saw him he kidnapped a bunch of humans to mutate into his own private army and to infect others."

"Thanks for the reminder there Raph." Casey managed to get out in between button pressing.

"You two do realize you're trying to fight the same battle but neither of you are sure which way to go to make it happen, right?" Aaliyah questioned the two elder turtles dubiously. At that point Splinter seemed to lose all hold on the conversation.

"I get that." Raph said. "But the wait and see game is a risky one to do, and it might not even work."

"No riskier than going off the handle and hoping we can escape those rat mutants again." Leo shot back.

"This is pretty typical huh?" Renet asked Jennifer from the kitchen as she took some frosting from the fridge as the first batch of brownies were getting ready to be pulled out. She had laid the time scepter on the counter but it was always in the same room as she was.

Jennifer shrugged. "The way I've heard it this is actually a light argument." She answered the girl. "But yes, basically."

"There is one thing I haven't heard brought up yet." Aaliyah said.

"What is that?" Raph asked the white masked turtle girl.

"Change them back into regular rats." She responded.

That drew a few moments of silence from the two brothers as they stopped to think about that. "Mikey doesn't necessarily remember how he made the retro mutagen we used to help the people the Kraang took to Dimension X." Leo lamented.

"So what?" Raph asked. "Mikey had no hand in developing the retro mutagen that we used to turn Mr. O'Neill back to normal or the retro mutagen we tried to use to turn Karai back to normal."

"Raph's right about that dude." The youngest orange masked brother reminded as he and Casey continued to play.

"Granted." Leo allowed. "But the biggest obstacle is mutagen itself. We don't have any of it lying around here and trying to attack a Kraang facility for it is risky."

"True." Raph agreed. "We don't have the indispensable demons around that Fulcanelli did."

"We could ask the Mutanimals for help." Aaliyah suggested. "They did attack the Kraang facility that Hector did when he retrieved the mutagen they used to mutate Candy and I."

"They were going in to destroy it." Leo corrected the turtle girl gently. "There's a major difference in strategy there." He turned just a bit to see Splinter now standing in the dojo entrance. "I'm sorry, Master. Were we disturbing you?" That drew everyone else's attention, and the comment had been made just after Jennifer pulled the brownies out and she and Renet came to the kitchen entrance to see what was up too.

"It is time." Splinter said, but Jennifer caught something different in his voice, in his demeanor. She was about to point that out.

But Leo caught on too, especially after their last experience. "Rat King." He stated with a glare. "Let Master Splinter go." April and Donnie had emerged from the lab now.

"I will in time." Splinter spoke, though it was indeed Rat King's words. "After I issue my challenge. For you turtles to meet my warrior at the construction site for the new library in two hours for the fight to determine the rights to this city."

"You've got be joking." Raph said. "Why would we agree to that?" Just because he didn't agree with his older brother's line of thinking didn't mean he couldn't see it. And he sure didn't like being dictated to by their enemy either.

"Because if you don't I'll turn them loose. Into Central Park." Rat King said through Splinter. And then with that he released the rat master. Donnie and April were quickly at their sensei's side and they started to lead him over to the couch.

"Are you alright Master Splinter?" April asked him gently.

"I am fine. Now." He answered her.

Jennifer wandered over to the freezer and opened it. Ice Cream Kitty looked at her for a second and then handed the blonde a cheesesicle. Jennifer patted her on the head gently for a moment and then closed the door and she brought it over to Splinter with Renet just behind her. "Here you are sensei." She said. "I thought that might help."

"Thank you my dear." Splinter replied as he took it from her. "I heard everything that the Rat King said to you all."

"Central Park?" Mikey asked. "How will those four avoid hurting all of those people?"

The response came from behind them. "They won't." They all turned to see Karai coming down the main hall way from the shadows and approaching her family and friends. "This means I have a feeling we're going to have to meet as they wanted."

"But it's a trap, it has to be." Renet said.

"Obviously." Raph agreed with the apprentice time mistress. "But what choice do we have?"

"Karai is right, we do not have one." Splinter answered with as much authority as he could muster, which to be fair was a lot. He was still a bit uncomfortable about not calling his daughter Miwa but he understood her point that was the name she had grown up with.

"Why should we be worried?" Mikey asked. "We already know we're the turtles of legend." He looked to Renet. "You said so yourself."

"Confession time." Renet started shyly.

"You lied about that too." Raph guessed with a roll of his eyes.

"No." Renet said a bit indignantly. "I didn't lie about that. But…this wasn't supposed to happen."

Mikey looked at her confused. "Then why did you decide to stay here?" he asked.

"Not her being here for her time off, Mikey." Donnie interrupted. "I think she means this mutant rat thing."

"Yeah." Renet confirmed. "It's not in any of the things I've read about you guys. Now, It's probably getting written in now so you guys should've never known the difference, but I remember it originally and Rat King shouldn't be here."

"Someone else is messing with the timeline." Leo surmised.

"I'll give you a guess as to who." Raph said.

Mikey thought a moment. "Rabid squirrels." He suggested. Leo gave him a glare and Raph punched Mikey in the arm.

"No, Mikey." April said. "It has to be that Verminator X that we met at the Old Athens Museum."

"That's what I thought too." Renet said. "Unless we have someone else time protected like him that is going around like he is."

"Regardless that doesn't help us now." Casey said.

"Mr. Jones is correct, it does not." Splinter agreed.

Leo looked to the apprentice time mistress. "Renet, can you stay here with Master Splinter while the rest of us go and meet the Rat King and his mutants?" He requested.

Renet nodded. "Sure." She replied.

Leo looked to the rest of the team. "We might not have the individual skills to beat them but I'm hoping we can do it by numbers." He said and directed his gaze to Raph. "You got a problem with that idea bro?"

Raph shook his head. "Nope. It's worth a shot." He answered.

"Then we better get going." Donnie said as they started toward the turnstiles and the Party Wagon, the brownies all but forgotten.

Except by one. "Well there goes dessert." Renet lamented.

"I believe we can handle that one." Splinter said to the apprentice time mistress with a small smile and rose from the couch so the two could go to the kitchen.

About forty five minutes later the team showed up at the construction site. There seemed to be no signs of any life but they already knew that didn't mean anything. Leo looked to Casey and the four girls. "We seem to be alone, and I'm sure they expected that we wouldn't come alone, but find another route in and the four of us will take the most obvious route." The blue masked turtle ordered.

"Will do." Karai said. She exchanged a brief look with Aaliyah as it really was up in the air as to which of the girls should lead them. After a moment the turtle girl gestured for the kunoichi to take the lead and she did so. It was difficult to gauge rather April was okay with it or not though.

Meanwhile the four turtles headed into the construction site. As they moved further it there was still no evidence. Finally Leo called out, "We're here Rat King. Show yourself."

The lights flashed on and on one of the girders stood the Rat King. He however was not alone as portals opened up and lots and lots of Kraang came through those portals, their blasters raised. For better or worse there was no sign of Kraang Subprime at least.

"Welcome to the show, my friends." Rat King announced. "Tonight we shall see the end of these meddlesome turtle freaks."

Each of the Kraang began chanting out, "Kraang! Kraang! Kraang!" Though it was unclear if this was because that was all they could say of if they had decided all of this was due to their leader Kraang Prime.

Then the four rat mutants came out. Caligula had his broad sword out, Nero had his scythe out and full sized. Claudius had his jagged daggers out and Commodus had out his chain spike out.

"I guess we're not going to enjoy pizza and a soda first." Mikey joked as he took out his nunchuck's. His brother followed suit with their own weapons and waited.

"That's not looking so good." April whispered as they made their way up a side of the scaffolding.

"All these Kraang." Casey mused. "We have to try to take them out."

"Not yet." Karai said. "We need to make sure we're better positioned.

Aaliyah wasn't quite sure the vigilante and the red head were exactly thrilled to be taking orders from their former enemy. But she knew in this case the kunoichi was also right. "Karai is right; we need to be better set up." She looked around a bit. "Casey, you take the left side. Karai the opposite way of Rat King. April and Jennifer to the left. I'll double back behind us."

The four nodded and they went their separate ways. Sometimes Aaliyah really wished they had even a quarter of the numbers that the Kraang seemed to have but since nothing could be done for it she started onto her self-assigned section.

The four turtles moved into defensive stances as their rat counterparts attacked them. "They're weapons are only more lethal than ours." Raph muttered as he blocked the jagged daggers of Claudius.

"At least your opponent is using a weapon that can be lifted believably." Leo countered his red masked brother as he barely blocked the downward swing of the large broadsword with his two katana blades.

"And at least your weapons are pretty much the same size." Mikey added as his nunchuck tangled with the spiked mace. They both pulled at the same time but Commodus followed through with another swing that the orange masked turtle could barely dodge.

Donnie stayed quiet. Aside from the fact that the scythe blade was larger than his own, they still were basically wielding the same weapon. That was the good news but it was countered by the very simple fact that each of the turtles was evenly matched with the rats, and only right now. If they used their martial arts skills then they would have the edge since they knew what Splinter knew.

Each of the second team moved to their positions and had their T-phones out, ready for the word on when to strike. Casey and April weren't quite sure though rather to expect a command from Aaliyah or Karai. Jennifer thought they really had to come up with an official command structure for situations like this.

"Luckily it seems as if the rats would almost rather fight with their weapons than with their skills." April whispered to Jennifer. "It's kind of a small consolation; it just means they're evenly matched instead of overmatched."

Rat King seemed to notice that too. He looked to some of the Kraang droids and they were slowly lowering their lasers as if they were going to try to shoot the turtles from behind. Aaliyah quickly texted **Now!** To the other three T-phones before taking out a shuriken and throwing it at a Kraang droid before drawing her bunrei's and taking out another couple of them.

Karai drew her tonta and started to attack the Kraang droids in front of her.

Casey drew both of his hockey sticks and started to attack the Kraang droids on his side.

April and Jennifer worked together to deal with the Kraang droids on their sides.

Each side had other Kraang droids blasting at them from other layers of the half made building.

"I guess the cavalry had to strike now." Mikey noted.

"Better than being sniped." Raph decided.

From out of nowhere one of the Kraang biotroids showed up and started to fire at those above it. "Ah, snap." Casey muttered. "Trouble."

"What is that?" Jennifer asked her red headed friend.

"A Kraang biotroid, it's stronger and harder to deal with." April said. 'And it…it has butt-cannons." She added with a bit of an embarrassed blush. Jennifer understood that embarrassment.

"Let's see that thing deal with this." Casey stated as he placed the hockey sticks away and took out a baseball bat and two baseballs. As the biotroid prepared to shoot the butt cannons Casey raised the baseballs and then hit them with the bat. The two balls lodged into the cannons and the thing backfired on itself, blowing up. "Home run! Goongala!" Casey exclaimed.

A Kraang droid came in from behind the celebrating vigilante and blasted him square in the back.

"Casey!" Both Raph and April gasped in horror as he started to fall from the girder and toward the ground.

Lightning fast Karai disposed of another Kraang droid and then leapt off of her girder. She pulled a grappling hook that the turtles also used (though no one really knew when she had gotten ahold of one) and then shot it out so she could use that to swing out and catch Casey in her arms. They fell to the ground rather awkwardly.

The turtles got clobbered hard by their opponents because they were distracted. Aaliyah dealt with her Kraang droids and then started to hop down after them. April and Jennifer hid behind some girders. "What if he's badly hurt?" The blonde asked.

April took a nervous swallow. "Well he didn't hit the ground so that's a plus." She said as she remembered the damage Raph had taken after being thrown off a building after Hector ambushed him. Of course the stadium was higher up but then again humans were usually more fragile than turtles.

"We have to get him out of here and checked out as soon as possible to avoid any more problems than may already be." Jennifer said.

"Maybe we can follow Rockwell's strategy." April suggested. "Use our combined psychic abilities to have the Kraang shoot at each other as well as Rat King and his mutants." She texted her plan to the other turtles. "That way if we weaken from this Raph and Donnie will come for us." The blonde nodded.

Raph and Donnie did indeed get the text and Aaliyah seemed to understand as she took the two brother's places.

"This shouldn't have involved you girl." Rat King said. "But if you will stand by these turtles than you shall fall just as they will."

"No one's falling today Rat King." Leo vowed.

The two girls focused their talents as they did when May had used an army of empty Kraang droids, ignoring the small but numerous numbers of Kraang minds inside of those droids. They very soon started to shoot at everything that they could. The rat mutants took cover as Rat King himself took cover and demanded, "What are you doing?"

Leo ran over to take Casey. "Let's go." He said to Karai. He saw Mikey and Aaliyah behind him while he saw Donnie and Raph on either side of the April and Jennifer. So far they had stayed conscious despite the immense power needed for their distraction but it was clear the girl's turtle boyfriends was ready to catch them at a moment's notice.

"Shoot at the turtles." Rat King demanded.

"We do not seem to have what is known as control over what is known as our droids." One of the Kraang replied to him.

They got into the Party Wagon. Normally it would be Casey who drove but since he was hurt April found herself in that position since the front windows had no way to conceal a mutant turtle driver. She hoped she could remember all the rules for driving, aside from the patrol buggy the last time Rat King had shown up she hadn't driven much.

Luckily the red head did remember how to drive, or at least well enough to get them back to the sewer lair. Leo and Raph carried Casey over to the couch. Splinter and Renet had seen them coming out and were about to offer brownies when they saw what them. "What happened?" Splinter asked.

"Casey was shot in the back by a Kraang." April answered their sensei. "He would have fallen off the girder too if it weren't for Karai's quick thinking." She shot the kunoichi a grateful look which she acknowledged with a small nod.

Jennifer sat down a bit exhausted and Raph started to rub her shoulders gently. "We only got away because April and I combined our powers to make the Kraang shoot at each other."

"Rockwell would be so proud." Mikey drawled.

Donnie came back from the lab with his med kit and squeezed April's shoulders gently before going to check on Casey, who had Karai by his side already.

"Man, this didn't go the way we were planning at all." Raph mused. "What do we have to do to stop those damn rat mutants?"

Renet came out with some of the brownies. "Here guys, this might cheer you up a little and maybe it will even help us come up with ideas." She said.

Raph gave her a kind of annoyed look but didn't refuse the brownie when offered. Mikey dug into it eagerly. Donnie of course wasn't able to eat one right now. April found herself unable to eat right now. Jennifer took one but wasn't able to take more than a bite though she smiled at Renet and said, "They taste good."

"You did most of the work." Renet reminded her. "But I'm okay with taking credit for the frosting job."

Karai refused to take a brownie. She turned to face them all. "Look, I know it might be the riskiest solution but I say we attack a Kraang facility and steal enough mutagen to make retro mutagen and make those rats normal again." She announced.

Everyone exchanged looks as if they weren't sure that was a good idea but realized that this incident proved they had to find another way besides physical confrontation to stop the mutant rats.

Finally Donnie took a deep breath. "Alright then, where do we start?" He asked.

"We must determine the closest Kraang facility that has enough mutagen for our requirements." Leo said. "Can we do that with the Kraang communication orb?"

Donnie thought a moment as he checked Casey's vitals. "Probably if I hack into it and bypass some of the security requirements." He answered. "Casey is out cold and he might have a concussion. Luckily in the long run Karai probably saved him from taking any worse damage."

"Thank heaven." April said softly as she patted Casey's arm and kissed Donnie on the cheek. "Thank you for always taking care of us."

The purple masked turtle blushed. "Anytime." He said. He then looked to Leo. "I'll start working with the Kraang communication orb." He stood to go into the lab and April decided to go with him to assist in however way she could.

"I just hope we can get the retro mutagen done before Rat King decides to strike again." Jennifer said softly.

Can they get the mutagen from the Kraang? Will retro mutagen even work? Will it even be a fair fight if the Kraang have it their way? The adventure continues on.

Mikey: Please send us some help, anything. Recommend anything.

Raph: What he means is if you have any one you'd like to see feel free to let Myra know and see if it happens.

Donnie: You know that could work against us too right?

Raph: Not if they don't want to get pounded.

April: I don't think threating the audience is a good selling point.


	34. The Raid

Karai: Nickelodeon owns TMNT, not Myra. She just owns Jennifer, Aaliyah and one of the villains in this instance.

Everyone except the still injured Casey gathered into the lab and Donnie's request. He had the Kraang communication orb hooked up to one of his lab tops, though he wished that he still had Metalhead as it might have gone quicker…of course he also knew there was a chance it would instead cause them more problems if the Kraang discovered it and reverse hacked him.

"The closet minimally guarded Kraang facility with any mutagen is just short of New Jersey." Donnie told them. "We can make the trip in a few hours with the Party Wagon."

"I could take us there with the time door." Renet volunteered.

"Once the Kraang know we're there they're going to send reinforcements." Leo said to her. "Once that happens we might be glad to have the extra firepower available."

"Especially since we can't guarantee we'll have what we need when that happens." Renet mused as she caught on to the blue masked turtles point. "Alright, but I'm still going with."

"You sure?" Mikey asked Renet. He didn't really want to see the apprentice time mistress put herself in any more danger than she had too.

Renet nodded. "Positive. You will need all the help you can get, especially with Casey hurt." She answered.

"We cannot ask you to help us, but if you wish to assist we are grateful for it." Splinter told the young woman.

"How sure are we this facility is lightly guarded?" Jennifer asked.

"According to the scans I was able to pick up there are only about fifty Kraang droids currently there." Donnie answered the blonde. "If we can get in and get the mutagen before setting off any alarms than by the time the Kraang can respond we should be long gone."

"Remember that no plan ever survives contact with the enemy." Splinter said Donnie and then looked to the others to make sure they remembered that. "If we want this mission, and our ultimate goal to succeed, then we must be careful and be prepared for anything."

Each of them bowed slightly and said, "Yes Master." Except for Karai who had said Father instead.

"I will stay here and watch over Casey." Splinter said. "If I require help I shall contact the Mutanimals but no one here is to stay behind this time." He meant to exclude Renet from that one but she had made her decision to go clear. "Everyone must be able to help them reach the mutagen."

"I've made a holding case that should get us up to ten canisters of mutagen." Donnie said as he got up and came back with what looked like a regular business case, but when he opened it they saw it was customized specifically to hold mutagen canisters, five on each side. "It's fairly durable but I suggest that once we have it April should be the only one to have the case until we're back in the lair."

"Why April?" Both Aaliyah and Karai managed to ask at the same time.

"Because April is immune to mutagen do to her being a half Kraang mutant." Donnie answered with a little bit of pride.

Aaliyah nodded and said, "Cool." While Karai only rolled her eyes and they swore she had mumbled, "Figures."

"Let's get a move on then team." Leo said.

As they all left both April and Karai turned to look at Splinter. The kunoichi was grateful when the red head said to their teacher, "If anything changes with Casey please let us know." She requested. The rat master nodded and then the two girls moved to catch up with their friends.

They drove over to the facility that Donnie had designated and parked only a block from it. "It does seem quiet." Leo noted.

"Seems to quiet if you ask me." Mikey noted.

They snuck out of the van and started stealthily toward the Kraang facility. The five turtles used their grappling guns to scale the wall and then the four girls followed them up the wall with by rappelling the guns back.

"That was fun." Renet whispered. "Can we do that again?"

"Stay focused." Aaliyah answered gently. "We need to get the mutagen and get out of here."

"She's right." Leo said. "Let's move."

They went over the wall and landed quietly. Donnie started to direct them toward the area when an alarm sounded. Raph looked up at Mikey and the orange masked turtle held up his hands. "I didn't do it." He blurted.

Leo didn't see how the alarm could have gone off. Short of motion sensors there was no way they should have been detected yet. "Donnie?" He asked his smartest brother.

"I don't know Leo." The purple masked turtle responded. "I couldn't tell from the lair but according to my T-phone there are no sensors that we could have set off."

"Sewer apples." Raph muttered as he pointed toward a corner where a bunch of Kraang droids were coming around the corner.

The Kraang droids saw them easily. "The ones known as the turtles and the ones known as their human allies have also broken into what is known as Base 113." One of the Kraang stated. "We must do what is known as extermination." Then they started to blast at the team.

They started to dodge the laser blasts but Karai caught onto what the Kraang said. "Also broken into the base?" She echoed. "Who else could be here?"

"I sure hope not." Leo said as they continued to dodge. He had gotten over his distrust of the leader of the Mutanimals, who had been their former enemy, but he would still be mighty pissed if they had ruined their already tentatively laid plans. "Aaliyah, lead the girls in and get that mutagen. We'll keep the Kraang busy."

Jennifer and April both seemed a bit startled that Leo was entrusting them to complete the bulk of the mission without them. Renet didn't seem entirely surprised but perhaps a bit shocked since she was part of that team. Karai and Aaliyah nodded more confidently but the female turtle seemed to be a bit less sure of herself than the former Foot kunoichi.

"Come on." Aaliyah said and they all headed toward the entrance that Donnie had been trying to lead them all to before the alarm had gone off and they had been caught.

"What do you think set the alarm off?" Jennifer asked as they came to the door and Karai leaned down to pick at the lock.

"I don't know." April said. "But something tells me if we're not careful we'll run right into it inside."

"That's reassuring." Renet said.

Karai picked the lock. "We're in." She stated and they all slipped in. April pulled out her T-phone. She was glad that Donnie had downloaded a map to all of the T-phones as a precaution in case something had happened to splint them up, as had happened.

"We need to head right down this corridor, then at the second left turn we should arrive where the Kraang have mutagen stored." April reported and Karai started to lead them down the corridor. "From what I can tell it seems as if we're…I'm going to have to fill those mutagen canisters myself so the rest of you will have to watch my back."

"No problem." Jennifer and Aaliyah said. Karai did not respond as part of her was not entirely okay with that plan. Not that she wished to get further mutated either.

"Um, what do you want me to do?" Renet asked. She had proven she could fight when needed to but she still wasn't highly trained for combat.

"Just…help them out however you can." April answered.

They got to the door they needed and headed inside. Two Kraang droids moved to respond to them but Aaliyah used her bunrei's to cut them down to size. "Alright, go ahead April." She instructed the red head. "We'll watch the door."

April headed toward what looked to be a vat of mutagen. She was able to figure out how she could collect mutagen and Renet was able to find ten canisters for her to start to fill.

There was a roaring from the door way and they all looked toward it. "That doesn't look like any Kraang I've ever seen. Ever." Karai said.

"That's no Kraang," April told the kunoichi. In front of them was a black salamander like creature with orange designs up his belly, chest, and tail. "That's the Newtralizer. Donnie accidently released him when he rescued my father from a detention facility." She informed them and then added with a small bit of pride, "Donnie named him."

"Much to Mikey's annoyance no doubt." Karai noted with some amusement.

"We're almost done here." Raph said as he took out a Kraang droid and saw only four left. "Then we can catch up with the girls."

"Not so fast turtles." They heard. Their first instinct was to assume it was Kraang Subprime as the only other Kraang that could speak proper English except Kraang Prime. But when they turned it was not the one eyed Kraang in the Irma suit but was instead a multi tentacle and over muscled (for a Kraang) in a large bodysuit of its own that looked like a large muscled Caucasian human male. "You're not going to go anywhere unless you can defeat me, Kraang Commando."

"Another wacky one." Donnie said. "Where do they find these guys at?"

Kraang Commando ran forward and shoulder rammed into Mikey who sprawled hard to the ground. Donnie tried to attack him but he shot out and grabbed Donnie's bo staff with his large hand and then spun around, tossing him into a facility wall.

Leo and Raph aimed kicks at Kraang Commando's chest, but even when they hit it didn't do too much to him. He swung his fist and while Leo barely ducked it he got Raph in the chin hard.

"Booyakasha!" Mikey called out as he used his kusarigama chain to try to wrap up this new Kraang, but he was easily able to shatter the chains. Leo tried to use that as an opportunity to slash off the arms but a leg came up into Leo's chest and sent him sprawling too.

"I guess we're going to be leaving the girls on their own for a little longer." Donnie noted. "I just hope they're having better luck."

"What do you think you're doing here?" Newtralizer demanded. He then saw April filling a mutagen canister and growled. "You try to take mutagen, you must be destroyed." He raised his arms and started to fire lasers at them.

Karai and Aaliyah started to deflect those lasers with their weapons. Jennifer slid in between the two other girls to avoid the laser blasts and then came up, delivering a baton upward to his chin. She then extended the blades from the batons and used those blades to slash the lasers into smithereens.

Karai smirked. "She's good." She admitted to Aaliyah. "Especially for her beginning level."

"She is." Aaliyah agreed. "But what should one expect from Raph's girlfriend."

Newtralizer growled and then used his tail to smack Jennifer in the chest and face really hard. She was shot back pretty hard, though for better or worse Renet basically broke her fall. Karai now leapt up and kicked Newtralizer in the chest. He stumbled back into the corridor and hissed at her before turning to deal with some approaching Kraang. A mini missile launcher appeared from the back of his armor to deal with them.

"At least he doesn't seem to be a friend to the Kraang either." Aaliyah noted. "Too bad we can't seem to go with the enemy of my enemy is my friend."

"That seems to be his motto." Karai countered the female turtle with. "He seems to put us in the same area as the Kraang."

April was not filling another mutagen canister. "We only actually need four, right?" Renet asked her as she came up the red head, limping just a little though it was fading with each step.

"Yes." April answered. "Donnie has found out some of what Mikey did to make the retro mutagen he made when he was messing around but not all. But I think the idea was to be able to make have some extra retro mutagen around in case this happens again." She took a breath. "Plus we want the chance to be able to make some for Aaliyah, Candy, and Master Splinter if they're interested."

Newtralizer turned back toward the girls and stalked into the room. "Who wants to be the first to fall?" he asked.

"No one lizard breath." Karai snapped.

Aaliyah leapt at him and tried to kick him but the alien salamander caught her foot and tossed her against the wall. "Let's see what turtle steaks taste like."

"April, we're running out of time." Renet reminded the red head even as Jennifer managed to recover and she leapt on the Newtralizer's back. He struggled mightily to get the lithe blonde off. Luckily for Jennifer though she was able to do a better job keeping her balance and hold him thanks to her gymnastics training.

Karai came in and swept him off of his feet and Jennifer leapt off of his shoulders and landed gracefully on the ground. The kunoichi looked at the blonde shocked. "How are you doing that when you're fighting is pretty basic?" She asked.

April heard the comment and if it were here she would have been aggravated at that comment. Jennifer however did not share Raph's quick temper and was in fact probably the most even tempered out of all of them except for Mikey. "What I lack in physical training I make up for in agility and grace with years of gymnastics." She answered.

Karai nodded, slightly impressed. "Cool."

"Totally cold." Renet agreed and April sighed at the mispronunciation again.

Aaliyah had gotten up now but so had Newtralizer. The three girls had him semi surrounded.

Kraang Commando rushed the turtles again but this time they all turned went separate directions and then turned to face him in a semi boxed in position. Mikey was down to one nunchuck though, Raph thought the mostly healed sprain in his left leg was acting up again and Leo thought his right leg was aching as well. But they had other concerns right now.

"I don't know what Kraang Subprime was complaining about." Kraang Commando gloated. "You freaks don't stand a chance."

"We'll just see about that." Leo said. He looked to Donne and Raph. Both brothers nodded and Raph moved in to strike high. Kraang Commando moved to deal with that and wasn't noticing as Donnie moved low and tangled up the commando's feet with his bo staff and causing it to crash to the ground.

Mikey used his other nunchuck as a kusarigama and this time wrapped it around the brain like alien who, much like Kraang Subprime in the Irma droid, was not dead center in the droid but was protruding just a little. The orange masked turtle yanked him out and tossed him away hard.

"Piece of cake." Raph said. "You know, if it causes a mild toothache with it."

"Not so fast reptiles." Kraang Commando said. He was looking right at the turtles as the extra tentacles extended out so that he was now at the turtle's height. He then ran full force at the turtles but they dodge the swinging tentacles. "I'm not done yet."

"This guy is full of tricks." Donnie noted. He used his bo staff to block a tentacle but it wrapped around the wooden stick and tossed it to the side. He tried to swipe at the purple masked turtle but he jumped over the attack.

"Come on Mikey." Raph said to his youngest brother. "I have an idea."

"Right behind you dude." Mikey replied.

Newtralizer tried to do a full around tail slap. Jennifer cartwheeled backwards to avoid it. Karai jumped over it and then Aaliyah barely managed to catch it in her hands before shoving him back towards the kunoichi where she responded by kicking him in the back to make him stumble backwards.

"Number four." April whispered. "Come on."

Renet ran forward and using her energy knuckles she slammed them into Newtralizer's side to make him stumble back again. Then Aaliyah jumped up and kicked him right in the jaw to knock him to the ground.

April moved onto number five. "O'Neill, we really need to get going. Hurry up." Karai called to her.

"I'm working on it." April responded. She wanted to make sure she could get the mutagen they needed for all of their purposes.

"At least he seems to be out of it." Jennifer noted.

"Yes, but we don't know for how long." Karai reminded the blonde.

April got number six before Karai came over to her. "Forget it O'Neill. We have enough to deal with the rats, that'll have to do." The kunoichi stated. April wanted to argue but then they heard more Kraang coming.

She capped the last mutagen canister and placed it in the briefcase. "Let's go meet the guys and hope that they're ready to go too." April announced. The five girls ran out, Renet snatching a grenade from Newtralizer and tossing it at the Kraang.

They ran outside. April and Jennifer gasped as Karai let out with, "Damn." At the sight of the big Kraang. They saw Raph and Mikey lifting a large droid body and they tossed it straight at the Kraang. At the last moment he turned around just in enough time to get smacked by it.

"We have mutagen." April announced as the girls ran to the guys.

"Let's get out of here then." Leo ordered.

"Not so fast." Kraang Commando barked out as he tossed his own droid body aside. "This isn't done yet."

"Oh, come on." Raph drawled with annoyance.

Then one of the walls exploded and out stepped Newtralizer. He took one look at the scene and let out a horrible screeching sound. "You." He snapped though it was not clear if he was snapping at the turtles or at the giant Kraang.

"You're that experiment that got loose." Kraang Commando noted. "It's time to put this experiment back under lock and key. The turtles can wait." With that the Kraang attacked Newtralizer.

"Should we be helping him?" Jennifer questioned.

"Who?" Karai shot back annoyed. "The big Kraang thing that tried to kill the turtles or the big salamander mutant thing who tried to kill us?"

"We're actually not sure that Newtralizer is a mutant." Donnie stated matter of factly. "it's just as possible he's simply an alien from another dimension like the Kraang."

"Not now Donnie." Both Leo and Aaliyah stated at the same time.

"Look." Raph interrupted. "There's no reason on Earth we have to help Newtralizer." He looked to Jennifer. "The last time we saw this guy he was willing to kill us and Slash to achieve his goal of wiping out the Kraang. If they want to kill each other going at it that's their business." He said a bit softer than he would have for anyone else.

"We have our own problems to contend with anyway." Leo reminded the blonde. "So let's get this mutagen back to the lair so Donnie can work on the retro mutagen."

Part of Jennifer wasn't so sure she agreed with it but saw the turtle's points. Especially when it came to their own rat problems. She nodded slightly and they all made their way back to the turtle van. They didn't see Kraang Commando swipe at Newtralizer, or the black salamander raise his hand, with a disk in his possession, and teleport away.

Casey was up when they got to the lair. April gave him a quick hug. "I'm so glad you're okay." She whispered to him.

"No worries Red." The vigilante said. "It takes more than a laser blast to take out Casey Jones."

"Like a long fall off of an iron girder perhaps." Karai suggested as she walked over and placed a quick but gentle hand on Casey's right shoulder. "Saved you from that one, by the way." She gave a small wink. "Guess you owe me one, eh Jones?"

Casey laughed a bit. "Yeah, I'll get right on figuring out how to make up for that." He promised. "So what did I miss?"

"You missed our raid on a Kraang facility." Renet reported happily as Aaliyah took the briefcase of mutagen into Donnie's lab.

"Newtralizer attacked the lab just after we got there." Raph told his best friend. "Just before we got there. We had to send the girls on ahead to take the mutagen while we fought the Kraang. Then this big one calling himself Kraang Commando showed up and we had to fight him too."

"He had his own body to go with his droid one too." Mikey told him. "Even Karai hasn't ever seen that from the Kraang before."

"The Kraang always seem to be full of surprises." Splinter noted dryly. "Donatello, begin work on the retro mutagen." The purple masked turtle nodded and started to lab. April gave Casey another hug and then caught up with her boyfriend, holding hands as they went.

"At least we all walked away intact from that fight." Leo noted. "It could have been a lot worse after all."

"Enjoy it while it lasts." Splinter advised. "The road ahead to end Rat King and his rat mutants will most likely be a long and difficult one."

Now that the option is there, will Aaliyah or Candy want to become human again? What did Newtralizer steal from the Kraang now? Will the plan to mutate the rat warriors back to normal even work? The adventure continues.


	35. The Hunter

Leo: Remember that TMNT is owned by Nickelodeon. If you see it on TV Myra doesn't own it. Otherwise she technically does.

Donnie and April were in the lab working on developing the retro mutagen. At the least they knew they had to squeeze out enough to bring Rat King's four mutant rats back to normal. They also wanted some in case Aaliyah, Candy, or Master Splinter wished to be human again.

They pretty much had a please do not disturb sign on the lab door, mostly for work. But they still found time to exchange kisses and hold hands.

Raph and Jennifer were the same way. When they weren't training they spent a lot of time together, usually on the couch with some combination of reading, watching TV, or talking softly. Right now they were discussing some of their favorite shows growing up while they held hands, they sat on the couch but weren't really looking at anything but each other.

Further on in the living room Mikey and Renet were playing with Ice Cream Kitty, a combination of whipped cream and sprinkles being piled on top of her. Oddly as far as Leo was concerned the frozen treat cat didn't seem to mind it. Mikey took some ice cream from his pet's side and placed it on Renet's nose. The apprentice time mistress giggled and went to remove it.

Casey still felt a bit stiff after the laser blasts to his body. Karai was currently with him in the dojo helping him work out, and get his muscles back into top shape, and as the kunoichi put it 'perhaps a bit better for it'.

Meanwhile Leo had discovered something else he liked about their female turtle guest Aaliyah. The two of them were deep into a discussion about Space Heroes. "I would so love to see them make a Space Heroes The Next Generation." Aaliyah said to the blue masked turtle. "They could either go with a new ship and the same crew or even make a whole new crew and have the old crew make guest appearances."

Leo seemed to contemplate it for a moment. "Could be interesting but some of the really hard core space nicks might be turned off, especially if they use different characters." He replied.

Aaliyah nodded. "That's true." She agreed. "But I think the ones who are willing to give it a shot could be pleasantly surprised. There are instances where the original can be surpassed after all. And they could make some movies with the originals in the meantime."

Raph rolled his eyes and said to Jennifer, "I swear Leo is such a dork about this Space Heroes stuff, I can't believe Aaliyah is the same way."

"Everyone has their obsessions." Jennifer said with a non-committal shrug. "I've always like a video game and anime called Pokémon." She revealed.

"Never heard of it." Raph replied.

"Never?" Jennifer asked, a bit shocked that Mikey hadn't even seemed to hear about it then. When Raph shrugged again the blonde added, "I guess sometime I'll have to make you watch it or something."

Raph laughed. "You are the only person besides Master Splinter who could ever say that to me and expect me to ever listen." The red masked turtle replied.

Jennifer giggled. "I guess there are some advantages I have with you that no one else here does." She teased and giggled again when Raph blushed slightly at the comment. She had to admit that wasn't normally like her which made it even more of a wonderment.

Everyone jumped when a shrill alarm sounded. "What is that?" Renet asked.

"That's the perimeter alarms." Leo said as they all stood up. They headed toward Donnie's lab. Normally they wouldn't disturb him but something important could be up, especially since in the last six months their lair had been found by the Kraang, Fulcanelli's demons, and the Demon Oni.

It was as if Donnie and April had known they were coming as April had set the retro mutagen chemicals aside while the purple masked turtle was already at his computer looking to see what the problem was. "What's the sitch Donnie?" Jennifer asked.

April laughed a bit at that reference even though the turtles didn't seem to get it. "The alarms just went off, very edge of the perimeter." Donnie reported. "I think it might have been unintentional but the fact that it happened at all makes me think someone is looking for us. I'm bringing up the closest camera image I can find now."

A moment later Donnie found just that. The man was bulky but all muscle. It didn't seem to stop him from carrying around a sniper rifle of some sort. Donnie wasn't familiar with the type of rifle but he could see a scope on top of it, one that he recognized as an infrared one. He knew it would help him find any if their human allies as well as Splinter, and despite being cold blooded because of them being mutants it also left the chance they could be spotted that way as well.

"If this guy isn't looking for us I'd be very surprised." Raph said neutrally. It was clear the red masked turtle was very sure of the man's intentions.

Aaliyah narrowed her eyes just a little. "He looks familiar…I've heard of him, he's a hunter named Chuck Lorre. He's killed animals that are supposed to be protected, he is rumored to be a smuggler too. There have been stories that were unconfirmed that he's killed people too."

"We need to stop him before he finds the lair." Leo decided. He looked to his brothers and Aaliyah. "Let's go pay him a visit. Because we're turtles he might not be able see us with his infrared scope." He looked to the girls and Casey. "You guys stay here unless we call for backup. He can see all of you and Master Splinter much easier."

"I'm a half snake mutant rather I like it or not." Karai pointed out to her oldest younger brother. "I have just as much of a chance of not being seen as all you turtles are."

"You're also more skilled than anyone else here except for Master Splinter." Leo pointed out to his oldest sister, despite the slight look of annoyance from April at the comment and the attempt at protest from the still recovering vigilante. "If somehow he gets by us they're going to need your help here."

April felt the need to protest that but stopped at the look on Jennifer's face. She let out a small sigh but let it drop. The truth was she knew that Karai had more experience than she had, which was still better than Jennifer had and Renet was basically just shy of a non-combatant despite some interesting moves of her own. And as was said Casey was still recovering from the Kraang laser blasts.

"Please be careful." April finally settled on as she kissed Donnie on the cheek. Raph got the same thing from his blonde girlfriend and Mikey got one from the apprentice time mistress. For a moment Leo felt jealous before remembering that the only other unattached girls here was basically his older sister and the turtle girl that was going with them anyway.

"Take care of Ice Cream Kitty." Mikey said to Renet as they left the lair.

The five turtles stealthy made their way to the perimeter. They figured they would meet him a little less than halfway. They did their best to stay to the shadows so that they were not seen before they were ready.

Leo signaled for them to stop as they saw a small human shadow from around the corner. It wasn't long before they saw the beefy hunter around the corner. As he did so he hesitated as if he could somehow smell or hear that something had changed. Then without warning he raised his rifle and shot just inches from where Mikey was standing, making the orange masked turtle jump. He would have yelped out loud too if Raph hadn't shushed him with a hand over his mouth.

Aaliyah wondered if that was a lucky shot or something. Then Chuck called out, "Come out turtles. I know you're around here somewhere."

Donnie wondered how. It made sense if he was a good enough hunter he wouldn't just need infrared to track them. Then it occurred to him that his scope could have something more than just infrared, assuming they were even immune to it.

Raph raised a shuriken, angled his wrist so that the throw removed the scope from his rifle. Leo took advantage of that to come out from the shadows and strike Chuck in the face hard. He stumbled back, keeping a hold of the rifle but wiping a bit of blood from his lip. "Nice moves." He said.

"What the hell do you want with us?" Raph demanded as they came out of the shadows, all five of the turtles surrounded him.

"I'm hunting you down for my employer." Chuck answered simply.

"Shredder." Leo surmised.

Chuck laughed. "Yeah." He confirmed. "And guess what, I'm not alone."

"Huh?" Mikey asked.

At that both Raph and Leo were hit and they stumbled back. Donnie jumped back after his brothers as Mikey was struck, though he landed hard on the side. Aaliyah went flying as if something had slammed into her.

"Invisible guys now." Raph stated as he looked around. "Really?"

Donnie now wished he had brought his own infrared goggles with him, the ones that Raph had used to find Hector when he tried to use his chameleon like abilities to go invisible. Then he had an idea and started toward the fallen scope that was on Chuck's rife.

Chuck saw that and hurried over, kicking the purple masked turtle in the face. He went sprawling back. He then reached for the scope but Mikey used his kusarigama, twirled it over a pipe and used it as leverage. He exclaimed, "Booyakasha!" and kicked the hunter while getting a hold of the scope.

"Nice job Mikey." Donnie said. "Great work."

The orange masked turtle tossed it to his older brother. "Like a turtle do." He responded.

"What good will that do?" Raph asked his smartest brother.

Donnie raised the scope and saw what looked to be Foot bots. "Guys, they're invisible Foot bots." He revealed.

"Stealth foots." Mikey supplied.

Leo looked around a moment and then leaped up and cut a pipe that released lots of steam into the area. Similar to what happened when the fog had exposed Anton Zeck they could now see enough outline of the stealth foots, as Mikey had dubbed them, enough to fight back.

"About time." Raph declared as he took out one of the stealth foots near him.

Aaliyah rose with her bunrei's out. "Alright now it's like a shooting gallery." She replied.

"Sounds like plan to me." Chuck said as he aimed his rifle and shot it at the female turtle. She heard the shot and instinctively leaned toward the right but the bullet still managed to graze her right shoulder. She gasped in pain and dropped the bunrei in that hand.

Leo came up then and used his katana to slice the rifle in half. "You're going to regret that." Leo said.

Chuck snickered. "Will I?" he asked and then hit the blue masked turtle straight in the jaw and sent him reeling backwards.

Donnie turned his bo staff into a naginata and pushed the blade end through one of the stealth foots. He then smacked another with the back of his staff though that one didn't go down as the first had.

Mikey swung his nunchucks around to smack at the stealth foot around him but was having as much effect as Donnie's weapon without the blade. "These things must be more armored up than the average foot bot." He noted.

Raph went over to the white masked female turtle. "Are you okay Aaliyah?" He asked her as he moved her arm to take a look at it.

She flinched a little. "I'll be fine." She said. "It stings but we need to get rid of these things first."

"First things first." Raph told her and quickly used one of own wrappings to staunch the blood coming from the turtle girls arm, allowing it to double as a tourniquet until they could get back to the lair. "Now let's take these stealth foots out."

Aaliyah laughed a little. "How do we keep getting into using Mikey's names?" She asked.

The red masked turtle shrugged. "Because they got to be called something and the rest of us don't generally care to figure that one out." He answered simply.

Chuck tried to use the half of the rifle he still had to smash it into Leo's face but the blue masked turtle rolled out of the way of the attack and then delivered a kick to the hunter's gut. "I'd say you've lost this one Chucky." Leo said. "You have no gun and your stealth foots are going down like flies."

"I don't need stealth bots to deal with you." Chuck said as he lashed out at Leo, but he dodged it.

"You're not just dealing with Leo." Mikey pointed out as he emerged from the fog to be behind him. "Mess with one turtle and you mess with us all."

Chuck glanced around from one turtle to the other. He could vaguely see the other three turtles dealing with the stealth foots but it wouldn't be long before the other turtles showed up.

"I think you better run back to Shredder before you lose that ability man." Mikey tried to threaten. Somehow Leo wasn't sure that went off the way the orange masked turtle wanted but it was somewhat of a valid point.

"If you think I'm done with you turtles you're very mistaken." Chuck told the turtles and then ran off. Leo actually contemplated going after him but any chance at that was lost when a stealth foot's illuminated form got in his way. Although he was able to quickly cut it down there was no sign of the hunter.

Leo saw the other three turtles had dealt with the remaining stealth foot. Now that the fight was over and the adrenaline was starting to wear out Aaliyah was starting to feel the pain in her arm more acutely. She sheathed her weapons and placed her left hand over her right arm. He headed over to the white masked turtle. "How are you doing?" He asked.

Aaliyah grimaced just a little. "It kind of stings." She admitted. "I think we better go back to the lair so that way I can get this taken care of."

The turtles started back to the lair, Aaliyah doing her best to keep her arm as still as possible to minimize the pain. "When I was going through what one would consider my senior year of high school I had to write a paper on a new experience every month for six months." She commented.

"Want to write a paper on this?" Mikey asked her. "Donnie could probably grade it like a really strict English teacher."

Aaliyah chuckled a bit but kind of regretted it when it shook her shot arm. "None of those papers were about this so maybe it would be worth something." She joked with a small grimace.

Jennifer sat with Renet, both of them petting Ice Cream Kitty who seemed to enjoy the attention. Karai paced restlessly all but ready to draw her tonta. Casey sat on the couch feeling kind of restless himself though still feeling sore. April sat by him feeling almost as restless and worried.

"We shouldn't have let them go off on their own." Karai stated. "The guy was packing a rifle. What if he got one or all of them?"

"And what could we have done?" April asked. "If this Chuck hunter guy did manage to take out the turtles our chances would be really small." She didn't think it wise to point out to Karai that at least her boyfriend wasn't the one out there in the line of gun fire like hers and Jennifer's was. Even Renet could be classified as dating Mikey the way they acted.

"Rather Casey wants to admit it or not he's still recovering." Jennifer said. "April is just barely at the turtle's level, you're there but it wouldn't make a difference if the turtles were taken out too. I'm not even near that level."

"I'm not either." Renet added. "We'd all basically be in the way." She reached over and rubbed under Ice Cream Kitty's chin, making her purr in delight.

"I'd still feel better if we were out there." Karai said with a sigh. "I hate being on the sidelines like this, even if the reason for it is to help protect my father."

"I understand that." April promised the kunoichi. "I've followed the turtles on dangerous missions because I didn't want to sit on the sideline like some stupid sidekick too." She took a breath. "But even I know my limits, and a gun really is one of those if I don't have to be around it."

"That's fine for you O'Neill." Karai replied. "But one thing I can say about Shredder is good bad or otherwise he made sure that I was prepared for even a gun toting moron."

"I expect that possibility too." Casey said. "Especially after meeting the Kraang and their lasers." He laughed. "Of course the Kraang couldn't hit the broadside of the barn." He flinched a bit as his back nagged at him. "At least in most cases."

"Never thought of you as a barn Jones." Karai teased with a small laugh.

"That's not what my hockey opponents would say." Casey bragged. "They could never get past old hawk eye Jones. And if I was the goalie, it'd be like throwing something over a barn roof."

"And now you're lying on a couch from a laser blast." April finished. "If only they could see you now."

"Thanks Red." Casey said with a roll of his eyes. That made all four girls laugh just a little.

"Anytime." April replied with a small smile.

Karai looked at them and wondered just when she had gotten so used to the random jokes and teasing that the people around her had done so easily. This was not at all what she had seen while being in the Foot.

They heard the turtles come and they turned to see Aaliyah holding her arm. "What happened?" Jennifer asked.

"I got in the way of a bullet." Aaliyah tried to joke as she sat down on the couch. April ran to the lab and came back with Donnie's first aid kit. The purple masked turtle unwrapped Aaliyah's arm and cleaned the wound.

"Will she be okay?" Leo asked his smartest brother.

Donnie nodded. "Yeah, it grazed her skin. It's a wicked one but it never entered her arm." He answered. He looked to the blonde. "In fact I think you could probably heal this one without a problem."

As Jennifer got up to walk over to Aaliyah, Mikey took her place across from the purring Ice Cream Kitty and sitting next to Renet. She sat down and placed her hand over it. "Does it hurt?" The blonde asked.

"Not at all." Aaliyah joked. "Just like falling on a feather bed."

"Right." Leo said. "if those feathers are razor sharp."

Jennifer smiled a little. "I don't know where this falls on being stabbed, but I was stabbed in the side when the turtles found me." She noted. Sure enough as the two girls had this conversation they were seeing Aaliyah's arm start to get a small blue glow and when that passed her arm was fully healed.

"Feels much better." Aaliyah said and looked to Jennifer. "Thanks." In truth it felt a little sore but she was sure the blonde couldn't take care of that, but she knew that would be easy enough to take care of.

"Amazing." Donnie said quietly. He still wasn't sure how she was able to do this but he resolved to let the lithe blonde come to him when she was ready to learn about what had been done to her.

"So what happened to hunter boy?" Karai questioned.

"He ran off, but he was looking for us." Raph answered his older sister as he crossed his arms over his chest. "He was working for Shredder though."

"He also had Footbots that could also go invisible with him." Mikey added. "It was cool in a not good kind of way."

"And more importantly that means they'll be back." Leo said. He looked to Donnie. "If we assume this invisible thing isn't unique, what can we do to mitigate that stealth advantage?"

Donnie thought a moment as he p

Chuck entered the throne room of the Foot leader, The Shredder. The sharp blade clad ninja master rose to look down at the newest recruit and the hunter found himself flinching just a little. "I regret to inform you that I was not able to end the turtle's master." He said.

Beside him and just below on the first step was the mutant assassin Tiger Claw. He laughed just a bit. "I knew that a hunter with meager skills as yours could never defeat anyone as skilled as those reptiles." He commented.

"Enough." Shredder snapped at his second in command. Then he looked to the hunter. "Tell me why I should let you live after this failure."

"I wasn't able to kill the turtles but there is one silver lining." Chuck said to the ninja master. "I am positive that the only reason they appeared was because I was close to their lair. I can find them again."

Shredder narrowed his eyes in thought for a moment. Then he looked to Tiger Claw. "Go to the dungeon and bring the dockworker you captured to Stockman's lab." He ordered the assassin and then looked to Chuck. "Come with me to Stockman's lab. You shall receive another chance and you shall receive the change that you wanted."

The Hunter smiled at this. "I am honored master." Then he followed Shredder to the lab. They entered to find Stockman buzzing about with similar preparations as he did when Shredder had ordered the mutations of Streanko and Zeck into their current forms.

Speaking of the two reluctant mutants they were standing and waiting for Shredder's orders as well. With them were also Hector, Bradford and Xever.

Tiger Claw emerged from an elevator dragging the dockworker in front of him. "Here he is master." The mutant assassin announced.

"I have dug around asss you requesssted massster." Stockman said as he landed beside the Shredder and gave him some papers. Shredder took them but did not look at them so the mutant fly scientist summed it up. "The mansss name isss Douglasss Sssteinback. He isss a dockworker but he isss alssso employed as a spy for the Golden'sss."

"I thought they were ended when they were defeated during the final confrontation on the rooftops." Hector noted.

"They apparently have brought up sssomone for their leaderssship." Stockman told the chameleon like mutant.

"They are of no consequence at this point and time." Shredder declared. "Soon we shall either have them join us or be destroyed." He then looked to Douglas. "So you were indeed a spy and not some hapless stranger looking for a quick buck. All the more of a shame for you then, for you shall be the first to be mutated."

"Please, mister." Douglas tried to beg. "I was just doing what I was told, honest. Let me go and I'll just skip out of town, you'll never hear from me again."

Shredder laughed shortly. "I think not. Despite you're questionable loyalties I think I can make it so your attitude will be changing. And your animal will be very apropos." He looked to Tiger Claw who tossed him into the mutagen pool.

Rocksteady grimaced just a bit. Shredder had said the same thing to him after all before he had been transformed into his mutant state. They watched as the man's nose elongated, he grew a tail and his hands and feet became more claw like. When he was released out dropped a large mutant mole.

Then Shredder looked to Chuck. "And now it is your turn to become what you wanted. To match your skills with your strength." Stockman made some adjustment. "All you need to do is jump into that mutagen tank."

Hector watched on fascinated. Out of all of Shredder's mutant army only he had been trying for this result, so he could destroy Raphael and break Jennifer. Bradford and Xever had been mutated by accident, Stockman had been mutated because of a mutagen encased color, Zeck and Steranko had been forcefully mutated after using Karai as bait and trying to steal his helmet, the Kuro Kabuto. And since Hector had not been part of the foot clan at that point, he had never seen one become mutated willingly.

Chuck hesitated only a moment before he went over to the mutagen tank and then stepped right into it. As he was submerged into the mutagen he seemed to grow a small tail, but more importantly he grew horns on his head and his feet became cloven, how his hands avoided such a transformation was a mystery. When Chuck was released he was now a large brown bull, who stood beside the newly mutated gray mole.

It was almost a study in contrast as the mutant bull Chuck roared in triumph and the mutant mole Douglas let out a roar in agony, and seemed all to reminiscence of the birth of Zeck and Steranko as mutants themselves.

Shredder gave a cold smile. "Now we will try this again." He decided.

What are Shredder's plans for the new mutants? Will Donnie be able to make the retro mutagen before Rat King strikes again and be able to nullify the advantage of the stealth foots? The adventure continues.

A/N: The stealth foots are based off of the foot tech ninjas from the '03 series. The new mutants are based off of two mutants from the '87 series/toy line. If you know who they are, that's great. If not, you'll find out next chapter. This however couldn't go in disclaimer since I didn't want to ruin story.


	36. Bull and Mole

Donnie: The new mutants are reimagined one from the '87 series so Myra doesn't own them. As for everything else if you see it on the show then again Myra doesn't own it.

"First things first." Shredder declared as he approached Douglas Steinback, who he had just transformed into a mutant mole. "You have two choices, you can serve me or you can be destroyed."

Douglas looked up at him rather resentfully, much like how Zeck and Steranko had looked at him after the ninja master had forcefully mutated them. He leapt at him with a rage but Shredder brought up foot to catch him in the gut and then back punched him hard to send him sprawling.

"Nice try." Shredder stated. "Now make your choice, mole."

Douglas still glared at him but reluctantly bent to one knee. "I will serve you…master."

"Very well." Shredder said and looked to Chuck, who had become a large brown mutant bull. "Lead Douglas, Bradford, Xever, Steranko, Zeck, Hector and some Foot bots to the sewers and resume that path. Find the turtles and destroy them."

"As you wish master." Chuck declared.

Donnie and April were again hard at work making the retro mutagen while the rest of the team sat around the TV watching Mortal Instruments City of Bones. April kind of wished she could watch it with them but wanted to be around Donnie and he had to make the retro mutagen so it narrowed that one down.

Raph and Jennifer sat together on the couch, his strong arm around his blonde girlfriend while her head was on his shoulder. His hand would occasionally reach over and stroke her hair.

Mikey and Renet sat on the couch together, Renet had her legs under her and the time scepter sitting beside her since Lord Simultaneous would kill her if she lost it.

Casey sat on the couch with Karai sitting just below him on the floor, looking as if she were mediating though was in reality was watching the movie as well.

Leo glanced at the movie as he was going at the punching bag. Aaliyah sat just over the couch watching the movie and was writing in a notebook that April and Casey had brought for her at her request. None of the guys were mean enough to try to read it behind her back, something they never would have done for each other.

Splinter sat under the tree in the dojo, he was trying to meditate as well but he could hear the movie as well. The truth was though that they were all anxious to be able to finish the Rat King and his rat ninjas that he had created with major help from the Kraang.

"It would be so awesome if these people were real." Mikey decided.

"How do you figure?" Raph asked his youngest brother. "We already have enough demons, mutants and aliens running around without adding vampires and werewolves and rogue shadow hunters to the fray."

"Who says we don't already have that?" Renet asked mysteriously.

Aaliyah looked at her oddly but before she could try to pursue the apprentice time mistress on that comment but the perimeter alarms went off again. No one really jumped since it had happened before but they all rose as the lab door opened to reveal the smartest turtle of the team.

"What's going on now Donnie?" Leo asked him.

"We have big trouble." The purple masked turtle answered simply. "We have basically every mutant of Shredder's down in the sewers along with a bull mutant and mole mutant we've never seen before and they're following the same path that the hunter guy took to try to find the lair."

"You've got to be kidding me." Raph grumbled.

"Is that just a coincidence by any chance?" Casey asked.

"Somehow I doubt that one Jones." Karai replied.

"Donatello, you must stay here and complete the retro mutagen; we cannot afford any more delays on that front." Splinter instructed his second youngest son. "April, I believe he could use your help as well." The rat master looked to the rest of his family. "The rest of you must go and stop Shredder's mutants from finding the lair."

"Hai sensei." Leo acknowledged and then looked to his team. "We've got work to do, so let's get out there." The ninjas, the kunoichi's and the vigilante headed out right off the bat. Renet hesitated only an instant but then followed them as she did not want to be left behind.

They weren't quite as stealthy as they had been when first approaching Chuck the hunter but then again there were mutants tromping around out there as well so they weren't being so quiet either and time was of the essence if they wanted to try to keep them from finding the lair.

"Alright." Leo whispered. "I'll take the bull, Aaliyah go for Bradford, Mikey go for the mole, Casey you get Bebop, Karai you handle Rocksteady, Jennifer deal with Fishface and Raph you get Hector. Renet you help whoever you think needs it." Each member of the team nodded in acknowledgement at their orders.

They were almost upon the mutant army but any advantage they had was taken away when Rahzar alerted his team, "I smell reptiles and humans." It was technically accurate since Karai was half snake as well as being human like Renet, Casey and Jennifer.

"Who're your new friends Rahzar?" Mikey asked his former friend as they stepped out of the shadows.

"You should recognize me turtles." The bull said. "I've come to make you pay for wrecking my hunt."

"That must be Chuck." Aaliyah realized.

"Yep, looks like he went all bull on us." Raph said.

"Yep, Taurus Bullba." Mikey declared and then shook his head. "Nah, that ain't right. How about Horn Hunter…nope…" He drifted off in thought.

"I think it's enough talk." Fishface interrupted. "Time to ground us some fresh meat."

"That's it!" Mikey exclaimed. He looked to the bull mutant. "I christen you Groundchuck."

"Maybe we should just be surprised that Mikey knows such a big word as christen." Raph suggested to his friends.

Mikey looked to the mole mutant. "Now what do we call you?" He wondered.

"You've got to be kidding me." Douglas said as he rolled his eyes. "Can we just get rid of these freaks in the already?"

"Freaks?" Leo questioned.

"Yeah, have you lost your mind you freakin' dirtbag?" Raph exclaimed.

"Hah, sounds good to me." Rahzar laughed as he thought about how Tiger Claw had found him in the first place and what the fly had uncovered about him.

"I agree." Mikey said which surprised everyone including the mutant dog even though none of the good guys knew what the bad guys did. "From now on your mutant name is Dirtbag."

"Oh, come on." Douglas, now Dirtbag, whined with exasperation. "I'd say this guy really needs a life if he was going to live past this evening." He then leapt right at Mikey with his teeth bared, and the orange masked turtle let out a little yelp before striking him across the face with his nunchuck.

"I guess it's you and me Groundchuck." Leo said to the mutant bull hunter as he twirled his katana around. "Too bad for you that I'm not wearing red."

Groundchuck shrugged. "That's alright. I never liked the color blue." Her responded and then tried to gore Leo, but the blue masked turtle stepped to the side and delivered a kick to his side.

Aaliyah approached Bradford and started to pace him, just as he did to her. "You don't have to side with them." Bradford tried as a distraction. "Side with us instead. Join the winning team and I'm sure Master Shredder will see to it that you are restored to your human form."

"Like he did with you?" Aaliyah shot back and then shook her head. "You're not the winning team and you're not the good guys. And I won't fight for evil as long as I have that choice." She remembered the threats and shock collars and even some of the torture Fulcanelli, Hector and Gregory had inflicted although it was Candy who got most of the torture. "Never again."

"It's your funeral then." Bradford declared and leapt at the female turtle, snapping his jaws at her. She back flipped out of the way and then delivered a round house kick to his jaw to send him reeling.

"Alright pork rind." Casey said as he took out his bat. "Let's see what you've got."

"You can't handle what I got son." Bebop responded as he went invisible. Casey kept his eyes trained for any sign of movement and he got what he wanted, the thin trickle of water in this area was good enough for him to see the footprints left as the mutant thief walked. Casey turned around and slammed the bat right into his chest.

"Found you." Casey gloated as he pumped his fist in the air.

"Yeah, let's see you do that again." Bebop demanded and tried to reactivate his cloaking field only to see it spark and fail to work. "Um, oh boy." He barely dodged a follow up attack from the vigilante.

"I owe you pain for your last attack girl." Rocksteady declared as he tried to gore Karai, but the kunoichi dodged expertly out of the way.

Karai landed lightly on her feet and laughed. "Yeah right Steranko. You've got to get your hands on me first." She stated. She knew why Leo had assigned her to deal with Rocksteady; she was fast enough to dodge whatever he sent at her regardless of whether it was fist, hammer or horn. "Face it; you're just too slow to catch me."

Rocksteady growled and tried to bring his fist down on Karai but she jumped up and kicked him in the face. The rhino mutant growled and tried again to attack her only for her to roll out of the way and then behind him where she delivered a kick to the back of his knee though that didn't do much more than anger him. The disadvantage here was he could take a lot of her attacks.

Hector gave a malicious grin and leapt for the lithe blonde he was obsessed with but the red masked turtle got in the way with a kick to his face. "I don't think so buddy." Raph said to him. "No way you're going near my girlfriend."

Hector laughed. "Think you can stop me reptile?" He tried to punch Raph in the face but he dodged it and kicked him in the chest hard, then brought his knee up against his opponents jaw.

"You have no idea how much I'm looking forward to taking you out." Raph said. "I owe you so much for all of the pain and misery you've inflicted on Jennifer."

"Is that what she called it?" Hector asked tauntingly. "That certainly isn't how I remember it."

"You're a creep with a jacked up memory anyway." Raph stated and kicked him in the stomach and then gave him an uppercut to the face that split his lip.

Hector didn't seem to be bothered by it. He smiled a little and wiped some of the blood from his lip. "First blood, at least for today." He acknowledged and laughed. "But I beat you to an inch of your life and threw you off a building, you'd still be out if it weren't for my little blonde toy. I think I've got more points in this little feud."

"Yeah, thanks for the reminder." Raph growled and jumped up, his hands grasping a pipe as extra leverage to kick Hector in the face. "I owe you big time for that too." He would never admit in a small way he should be thankful for that incident though as that not only showed Jennifer she could use that for others but it was the major thing for both him and Jennifer to explore their feelings for one another.

"It seems you've broken him." Fishface commented to the blonde mockingly as the fish mutant took out his butterfly knives and advanced on her.

Jennifer had her batons out though she lacked the confidence of her team mates to taunt with her weapons. "That's what you choose to call it." Jennifer replied. "I don't agree, and neither does Splinter. He's able to focus his temper and energy more into what really matters, which in this case involves taking you and all of your allies down."

With a roar of annoyance Fishface swiped his knives at the lithe blonde but she was able to block those with her batons and then got in a quick uppercut to his jaw before pulling back to avoid getting bitten by the mutant fish and infected with his venom.

Dirtbag produced a sledgehammer and swung it at Mikey, who barely dodged the attack and then by using his kusarigama he pulled the weapon away. The mutant mole growled and leapt to attack Mikey but was interrupted with a shot to the face from Renet with the time scepter. If he had been human still, Dirtbag may have had his nose broken from that shot.

Groundchuck had withdrawn a wicked looking hunting knife and was sparring with Leo. The mutant bull had the smaller blade but it was clear he knew how to use it effectively. He got a good punch in the jaw to the blue masked turtle but an attempt to stab him in the gut (Leo was sure it was sharp enough to pierce the plastron) was aptly blocked.

"Well this could be going worse." Casey noted as he took another swing at Bebop, who was quick enough to dodge it.

At that point they heard the sounds of Footbots coming their way and Rahzar chuckled even as he dodged another attack from the female turtle. "Our backup is coming up." He announced. "And this time we have enough Footbots to overwhelm this tunnel and to take you down."

"I think we're running out of time dudes." Mikey announced. "We need to do something like now."

"Any bright ideas genius?" Raph shot back at his youngest brother as he dodged a scythe attack from Hector, who the red masked turtle was starting to notice the mantis attached to that weapon seemed to be a favorite form.

Casey took a step back and as the first few Footbots were coming down the tunnel he let loose with a hockey puck with a cherry bomb ductaped to it into their midst. The explosion took out a few of them but it was clear there were more coming. "We really could have used Red and Donnie after all." The vigilante noted.

Jennifer barely dodged a mechanical foot that Fishface had aimed to her midsection, sure if she hadn't done so she would have a broken rib or two, and though she would heal herself in some small time she knew she didn't have it now. The worst part was that she knew without April here she didn't yet have the psychic strength to take out all of the Footbot on her own as she and the red head had done when May had controlled the empty Kraang droids or even what the two girls had done when Rat King had tried to set the turtles up against his rat mutants that had also resulted in Casey getting hurt.

Hector laughed. "It doesn't really matter where you freaks live, once we overwhelm you and kill you all," He looked to Jennifer and amended with a cruel leer which the blonde caught despite her fight against Fishface, "almost all of you, then your rat master will come looking to avenge his fallen students and then the Shredder shall have him."

"We won't let any of that happen." Raph declared to him with the typical air of menace he felt whenever he was dealing with Hector and he chose to threaten Jennifer.

Renet was just thinking about ways she could get the rest of them out of this harm's way when it seemed as if there was a breeze picking up around the sewers. At first she tried to dismiss it since it was the sewers and a basically open, if cramped area. But the breeze continued to what she almost considered hurricane levels.

The apprentice time mistress was not alone in that observation. "What is this?" Rahzar wondered as he looked around, barely dodging a large metal can that could have smacked him in the face. "What are you trying to do here?"

"It isn't us." Mikey defended as he dodged a few punches from Dirtbag. "Right?"

"No Mikey, it isn't." Leo confirmed as he blocked a knife attack from Groundchuck again. "Got to give you credit, dude. You know how to use that knife."

Groundchuck laughed. "You'll find that out even better when I gut you." The mutant bull gloated.

"If I were you, I'd get out of the way turtles." They heard a somewhat gravelly voice say from behind them in the tunnel as the wind picked up and even more and started blowing trash around as well.

Mikey recognized the voice and took Renet's hand to guide her toward the speaker. Leo backed off after recognizing the voice. Aaliyah and Karai followed the actions of the blue masked turtle though neither girl really knew why. Raph kicked Hector in the face again and then took Jennifer gently by her arm to guide her and Casey followed Raph's lead.

"What the hell are they up to?" Hector demanded as more Footbots came around the corner and was ready to try to overwhelm the team.

With his visor Bebop was the first to notice something and he gulped a bit. "Uh, hey, baby S. We got some company. The trash dude." He said.

"Oh, that is not so good." Rocksteady said.

"What are you two babbling about?" Fishface demanded.

From out of the shadows of the tunnel emerged the large mutant known as Muckman. Where there was no orange jumpsuit was either a green sort of skin that looked like garbage or even what looked to be half exposed parts of his skeleton.

Casey looked kind of shocked, Karai looked stunned herself. Jennifer actually looked a little scared which was weird since she hadn't seemed to even bat an eye at the sight of any of the mutants she had seen prior too. Aaliyah looked pretty much shocked as well but with just the slightest bit of disgust. Renet of course knew who he was.

"Oh yeah. Time for some power courtesy of the Noxious Avenger." Mikey declared.

Muckman continued to gather up the strength of the wind and the garbage, combined with some of the sewer water and was using almost like a hurricane to push back the mutants and the Foot bots.

"Is there anything we can do to help him?" Aaliyah asked.

Leo looked around and saw some of the pipes. These ones he knew sent water throughout the city and he hated to have to cause public destruction but the water pressure might be just the thing they needed to combine with the storm Muckman was driving up in order to send the Foot packing. He looked to Aaliyah and Raph. "Get ready to catch and direct those pipes guys. We're going to turn the pressure up on them and give them a bath." He announced.

Raph nodded. "Ready when you are bro." He replied.

Aaliyah nodded as well. "Ready when you are." She said to him, giving him a smile that for a moment seemed to make Leo's heart beat faster, something he hadn't experienced since his earliest days of sparring with Karai when she was with the foot.

The blue masked leader quickly put that feeling to the back of his mind when he could better consider what it could mean. He leapt up and used his katana blades to cut through the steel pipes. He wasn't sure how long that pressure would last before the water flow would dissipate and could only hope it would be long enough.

Both Raph and Aaliyah seemed to be aware of that time limit to as they followed behind and grabbed the pipes as they fell, adding to temporary massive water pressure to the garbage hurricane Muckman was building up. It almost immediately made the Foot bots short circuit and only Rocksteady and Hector (by taking a shape similar to Rocksteady) were holding their own against the hurricane. Fishface might have been able to as well if not for the garbage that seemed to smack him in the face. Everyone else was losing ground rapidly.

"How long is that pressure gonna hold up?" Casey asked.

"I don't know." Leo said. "But not for more than a few minutes."

"They don't seem to be getting far enough out." Mikey said. "Although of course the Foot bots are toast."

Renet raised the time scepter and focused on opening a massive time door behind the mutant army. It did slowly open but the next part required her to do something she wasn't sure she could even do, and that was to move the time door to overtake the enemies.

Mikey seemed to catch onto what Renet was hoping to do and used his kusarigama to take the piping that had been broken for the steam effect when they were down here last and with a moment of swirling the weapon to gain momentum he tossed it straight at them. It collided with Rocksteady who fell back into Bebop and Rahzar even as the water pressure got to Groundchuck and Fishface.

Casey got a baseball out and threw a rapid pitch that caught Dirtbag in his face just as Renet's strike with the time scepter minutes earlier had done and now the mutant mole lost his hold.

Quickly handing his pipe to Karai, Raph made a leap and kicked Hector in the chest hard, sending him to into the rest of the mutants and they all went through the time door. "Raph!" Jennifer shouted out as she realized at this point that her red masked boyfriend would get sucked in with them. Luckily Mikey's kusarigama chain wrapped around his upper arm and he held on as Aaliyah and the kunoichi dropped their rapidly depressurizing pipe.

Now that the pressure and the hurricane were all but gone Jennifer ran over to him. "Raph." She said and hugged him tightly. "I would prefer you not scare me like that again." She added.

Raph hugged her back tightly and stroked her hair lightly. "I'll try not to but I can't make any promises." He answered softly.

"Nice timing there mucky." Mikey said to the garbage mutant.

Just when Jennifer thought it couldn't get any weirder one of the mutants eyeballs slid out until it landed in the outstretched hand. "Spent a lot of time looking for you guys." Said the little eyeball. "A lot of weird stuff has been going on lately and we wondered what it meant."

"Some demons going on, some gang wars, an alien race and mad scientists making rat mutants to get rid of us." Raph drawled with a shrug. "No biggie there Joe."

"That might be a bit of an exaggeration." Leo replied with a glance at his red masked younger brother. "That's the second time they've come looking for us recently, trying to find our lair."

"It must be somewhere relatively close then." Muckman observed. "That ain't good I guess."

"We should hang out here for a while." Joe said to his…Jennifer wasn't quite sure what to make of this odd pairing. "Keep them at bay for a while. Plus we'll be close if the turtles need us."

"I think that might be a good idea Joe." Muckman agreed. "We could kind of set up shop in one of them smaller tunnels and stay there when we're not on patrol up on the surface."

"I'd ask if the smell down here would bother you." Karai remarked with a raised eyebrow. "But considering you're a pile of garbage with a talking eyeball maybe not so much."

The rest of the team looked at the kunoichi a little surprised but the garbage monster didn't seem to be too worried about the blunt comment. "Nah, we'll be fine kid." He answered. "And if it keeps you and yours a little safer than that's all that matters."

"Well said Muckman." Leo said. "We'll try to help get you set up as best we can. After we find out what Donnie thinks might help us out."

"And with that, we should return to the lair and make sure Master Splinter, Donnie and April know what is going on." Raph noted. "We'll see you around and keep you informed." He added to Muckman with a wave as they started back to the lair.

"Hey, where did you send all of those guys anyway?" Casey asked the apprentice time mistress.

"Honestly, I don't know." Renet answered with a shrug, drawing a snicker from Mikey and Casey and a small groan from both Raph and Leo. "It shouldn't really be placing them lost in time, but for all I know they might have landed on the other side of the world."

They returned to the lair intent on delivering the good news about the mutants failing and Muckman hanging out in that area to help protect them and that they should try to help him get more comfortable but when they went to the lab they found things grim.

"What's wrong?" Jennifer asked them as she came over to place her hand on April's shoulder.

"While you were gone the Kraang communication orb when haywire." April answered.

"What does that mean?" Karai asked.

"They're planning a two pronged attack." Donnie explained to his oldest sister and the rest of his family and friends. "The Rat King intends to challenge us tomorrow afternoon, in 'a fight where either they walk away or we do'," He used two of his three fingers on each hand to emphasize it was a direct quote, probably from the Rat King himself. "Meanwhile the Kraang are going to use that as a distraction to invade the city again, believing they can take out one turtle and group of humans."

"They've got another thing coming then." Karai promised with a glare at the orb.

"Where is Master Splinter?" Aaliyah asked.

"Well that's the two good things." April said as she now shifted to look at the female turtle. "The first piece of news is that two hours of incubation and the retro mutagen will be ready for the guys to use on those mutant rats. The second is that Master Splinter is going to get our backup."

Can they stop the newest Kraang invasion and the mutant rats? Will getting rid of the mutant rats stop the Rat King? Where did Shredder's mutant army end up at? The adventure continues.


	37. Preventative Measures Part 1

Splinter: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is owned by Nickelodeon, as is anything seen on the show. Otherwise it is owned by the author unless noted otherwise.

Luckily for the citizens of New York someone was dispatched quickly to deal with the pipe problems Leo and the others were forced to create in order to get rid of Shredder's invading mutant army. That however was the least of team turtle's concerns.

"We've had to make the retro mutagen twice as potent as normal." Donnie started to explain as he ran his fingers gently up and down April's back.

"Where they uniquely mutated like I was?" Karai questioned as she placed her hands on her hips.

"Not entirely." The purple masked turtle responded. "As far as I can tell Stickman must have been trying to make retro mutagen of his own and it somehow got mixed up with the special mutagen he was making to turn us into those serpents that Shredder wanted to control. That's what allowed you to go from serpent to human but also what was destroying your mind. I'm still not sure how he reversed the damage however…"

"Donnie, while we're young." Raph interrupted the long winded explanation that he sensed coming from the smartest turtle that he knew they didn't have time for.

"Right." Donnie caught himself and changed tracks. "As for Claudius, Commodus, Nero and Caligula they were previously mutated when he tried to make his own rat people and when that failed he took that knowledge from Master Splinter. Then when the Kraang mutated them they essentially became double mutated."

"But not exactly mutated." Aaliyah added. "That's why you doubled the retro mutagen, to try to counteract Rat King's original experiment." Donnie smiled at the white masked turtle in confirmation.

"But there is no way to know for sure that it will actually work?" Leo asked his brother with his arms folded across his chest.

Donnie shrugged. "Not without tests. Since they don't exist outside of those four rats the only other way, however implausible, would have been to get a sample of their DNA and do it from there."

"And that would only work if Rat King wasn't forcing this confrontation to go with the Kraang's next invasion plot." April added.

"Well that's great for you, but what about us?" Casey asked the purple masked turtle. "We have to worry about stopping this newest Kraang invasion without you guys. How do we make that work?"

"I will be accompanying my sons to confront the Rat King and his ninjas." They heard Splinter say from the entrance to the lab. "As for how the rest of you will help out, please come into the living room." They obeyed their sensei's request and were surprised to find the Mutanimals in there.

"Hey guys." Pete said as he gave up his roosting place on the tire swing to land on the living room floor. "I hear we're going Kraang busting."

"Long time no see, my friends." Slash said. He looked to his former owner. "Nice to see you brother."

"Good to see you to Slash." Raph said with a smile.

It was clear Raph and Slash weren't the only two members of both teams to feel the same way. "Hey." Candy said as Aaliyah came over and gave her a hug. "I'm so glad to see you again."

"Me too." Aaliyah said and then pulled back to look at the axolotl girl. "You look good, I guess living with the Mutanimals agrees with you."

Candy laughed lightly. "Yes. It's so great and I love listening to Mondo practice his guitar, at least when Rockwell was able to salvage one for him. We separated the water pool they have there because according to him I need mine to have some salt mixture in it. Works like a charm." She glanced around at the lair. "How are you doing?"

"Very well." Aaliyah answered with a smile. "Jennifer has been so amazing, I mean everyone has but being with her is like having a sister…" The female turtle drifted off as she was about to say again but only Renet knew of that part of her life right now. "And Leo and I have so much in common it's…well it's…" She wasn't certain what she wanted to say but Candy had her theories.

"Leatherhead." Mikey said excitedly as he went over to the giant alligator. "How's it going?"

"Well my friend." Leatherhead answered. "And you?"

"Great." Mikey agreed as he then brought Renet over to meet his friend. It was hard to know though if he should identify the apprentice time mistress as his girlfriend or not. "Renet this is our friend Leatherhead, though come to think of it you might already know that. I named him and he likes my world famous pizza noodle soup."

"Which isn't really world famous or even known about or liked." Raph added with a smirk.

"Details, details dude." Mikey said with a wave of his hand. Renet didn't want to point out that in this case his red masked older brother was right and that it would never catch on.

"So you're going to help us stop the Kraang, huh?" Casey asked. "That is so cool."

"That's the plan man." Mondo replied. The two high fived with a, "Cowabunga."

"Once we win this fight, we so need to throw ourselves a pizza party." Mikey declared. "Nothing says we saved the world like a pizza party."

Renet giggled. "Sounds good to me." She said. Being an apprentice time mistress wasn't necessarily conductive to celebrations.

"Renet should be able to take you to the Kraang base in New Jersey where according to the information Donatello obtained from the communication orb they are going to stage their entrance into this world." Splinter said. "We will take the Shellraiser to deal with Rat King and his mutants."

Donnie gave each of his brothers little squirt guns full of the retro mutagen. "All we have to do is squirt them with this, but we have to make sure we hit them or it will be days before I can make more retro mutagen, if we even get away." He told his brothers.

April knew they actually had three doses left over. One for Splinter, one for Candy, and one for Aaliyah if they wanted it. That however was supposed to be a surprise. Regardless there were only three making it difficult in the first place to repeat the process with all four if need be.

"Alright then." Leo said. "Slash take care of everyone."

The large black masked turtle nodded. "Will do Leonardo." He looked to the Mutanimals, Aaliyah, and their human allies. "Alright, let's move out then. We have to stop the Kraang before they invade."

April and Donnie hugged each other and kissed each other gently. Raph and Jennifer hugged each other as well. Mikey and Renet were kind of being shy about wanting the other to be careful. Aaliyah came over to Leo. "Be careful and come back to m…us." She said and hugged Leo quickly before heading out with the Mutanimals.

Splinter had to take a moment to be amused at each of his son's slight discomfort while being elated that each of them had a girl specifically worried about their safety and return. Then he cleared his throat. "Let us go, my sons."

They each nodded and the four turtles headed toward the Shellraiser with their master.

Meanwhile Renet stood just in front of the area that lead to the bedrooms. "Okay scepter." Renet whispered to the complicated device. "We really need you to work for us, okay?" She then opened up a door. "Okay, who's first?"

Each of them hesitated only a moment until Rockwell closed his eyes and then moment later opened them. "She has us within one mile of the jersey base." He announced. "So let's get this show on the road." Each of them stepped through the door and emerged on the other side.

For the moment it was quiet but it was just a little early for the information if what they heard was supposed to be right. "Do we rush the base?" Casey asked the huge turtle that used to be Raph's pet.

He hesitated only for a moment before responding, "Yes. We charge in and find the command center. If we can take control of it we stop the Kraang from summoning reinforcements from Dimension X."

They started toward the facility entrance. "Looks like they managed to repair the damage done from Newtralizer's break in." April noted, hating to admit she was somewhat impressed by that. Of course she wasn't sure that Kraang ever slept.

"Then we'll have to make our own break in damage." Slash declared, still somewhat miffed by the fact that Newtralizer had betrayed Slash in an attempt to destroy the Kraang. "Leatherhead, you and I are going to ram that door down and then Rockwell will use his psychic powers to lead us to the command center."

"Sounds like a plan." Leatherhead agreed and the two massive mutants started toward the door.

Jennifer frowned a bit. "Shouldn't the Kraang have some sort of plan for us?" She wondered aloud. "I mean they had to have known that we'd try something like this, even if they hadn't anticipated the Mutanimals."

"They don't seem to think too highly of us." Karai replied. "So maybe not…though it would be stupid since we infiltrated their base not too long ago."

The two large mutants slammed into the door. They had to repeat the process but it crumpled at the impact.

"Man, how do they do that?" Mondo questioned with a shake of his head.

"Just be glad it's not us." Candy decided.

While that had transpired Jennifer heard Leatherhead growl something that she wasn't sure she understood. "Anyone know what a Crag is?" She asked.

"Crag?" Karai questioned the blonde.

April's eyes widened as she thought back to what Donnie had told her about going into Dimension X. "Wait, I don't think that was Crag but it can't be…" She stated.

Slash and Leatherhead went flying and landed in front of the rest of the team. From the broken doors emerged smaller versions of both Traag and Grantor. Both of them belched fire from their mouths though the former actually belched lava.

"That might have been why they weren't too concerned about just us." Casey noted.

"Donnie told me about bigger versions in Dimension X that guarded Kraang facilities." April said. "I guess they decided they needed something smaller for their facility after we stole the mutagen."

"Then we'll just have to get past them." Slash declared. "Oh, and them too." He added as several Kraang droids were seen coming up from behind the miniaturized rock warriors. "I'll get the blue one, Leatherhead you get the red one. The rest of you take out those Kraang droids."

The team moved in to engage their enemies.

Leo pulled the Shellraiser by Central Park and the four brothers and their master headed inside and toward a small clearing in the middle of the park by the lake. As they were walking it struck Leo how long it had been since it had just been the four of them. Not that having April, Casey, Jennifer, Aaliyah, the Mutanimals and even their own older sister Karai was a bad thing but it had just been the four brothers and their master for over fifteen years. It was a nice adjustment but an adjustment none the less.

It was like Donnie had read his mind. "You know, as much as I've enjoyed making new friends and finally getting the girl of my dreams it still has really been a long time since it was just us as a family." He voiced.

Mikey nodded a bit. "Yeah, it's weird the direction that life takes you sometimes." He reflected seriously. The orange masked turtle was rarely serious and sometimes even when he tried to be it was sometimes met with ridicule from his older brothers. But not this time.

"That is generally the essence of life." Splinter said to his sons. "The only thing constant in this world is change. We should all be thankful that for the most part that change has been good, and not just for us." He thought briefly of Jennifer who had certainly only gained since having come across the turtles, not that she hadn't done her share for them, especially his hot headed temperamental son. "What matters is making sure that we not lose sight of those we have always loved in the face of those who just come into it."

Raph nods. "Makes sense. As much as I care about Jennifer I can't forget about my brothers or you, sensei." The red masked turtle said.

"At what point does someone become family?" Mikey asked curiously. "I mean is Slash family since he used to be Raph's pet? What about Ice Cream Kitty? How about Karai who is your daughter even though she hasn't been around us long enough? Or ou…Raph and Donnie's girlfriends?" He listed.

Splinter chuckled. "In the long run, family is also what you make it." The rat master replied to his youngest son. "And that is something we have had for years, and most recently have strived to improve it, be it girlfriends," He deliberately did not mention names since in his opinion Renet was quickly becoming Mikey's and he was waiting for Aaliyah and Leo to start dating. "Pets or even friends."

"What a touching comment about family, rat." Rat King said from around them though he slowly coalesced from a small scope of trees from in front of them. "It's too bad that we're going to make your little family crumble into dust." On all four sides of them emerged his rat warriors ready to fight the turtles.

"We'll see who wins this fight." Leo declared as he and his brothers withdrew their weapons.

"Attack my rat warriors." The Rat King ordered. The four rat mutants converged on the four mutant turtles. Then he looked at Splinter. "How nice of you to come and witness your son's end."

Splinter shook his head. "You are wrong, Falco." He answered, using the villain's true name. "You may have stolen my skills, even those that I have yet to teach my sons, but they will still win this fight regardless and send you packing."

Rat King laughed. "We shall see, we shall see." He said.

"He's sure got a lot of confidence in us." Donnie noted as he twirled his bo staff in anticipation of Nero and his long scythe weapon.

"I hope we don't let him down." Mikey added as he turned his nunchuck into the kusarigama chain as he prepared to face off against Commodus and his spiked ball chain.

Raph twirled his sais around as he prepared to face off against Claudius who in turn mimicked the action with his own twisted sais. "We send these rats back down the bottom of the ninja food chain and we won't let sensei down." The red masked turtle declared.

Leo had his twin katana out and crossed in front of him as he waited for Caligula who was drawing his broad sword. "We know what needs to be done, so let's make it happen." The blue masked turtle stated.

As if that were their cue the rat mutants attacked the turtles. Each swung their weapons and as if moving in concert the four turtles back flipped out of range of the original attacks.

Leo moved into range while the broad sword was down. He kicked his opponent in his furry chest with one foot and then brought his other foot down onto the hands that held the broad sword. He then kicked Caligula away from the weapon.

Raph met Claudius head on sai to twisted sai. They clashed for a minute before Raph realized the futility of this particular fight. He took several leaps back and sheathed his weapons as he did so then reached for the broadsword his older brother had forces his opponent to drop moments ago.

Claudius looked momentarily shocked since everything he had been taught about the red masked turtle said he would never do that. Raph was barely able to lift the weapon but once it was hefted he charged the rat mutant and swung for the head. He could only bring up his weapons to block the attack and while it was deflected enough the twisted weapon's points were taken off. "Much better." Raph stated as he tossed the broad sword hard into some bushes and then kicked him hard.

Commodus swung the spiked ball portion out and Mikey dodged it as he used the kusarigama to trip him up. His rat opponent recovered and tried again but the orange masked turtle used his weapon to intercept it and then rapidly stepped on the chain to draw him in, then with a, "Booyakasha!" kicked him in the face, the sudden impact forcing him to drop his weapon.

Donnie dodged the scythe portion and then brought his bo staff up against Nero's face, then turned around and exposed the blade of his weapon, using the naginata to chop the scythe in half. He quickly used the staff to slap the pointed end of the scythe piece toward Nero.

The rat mutant moved to immediately dodge it, which was Donnie needed as he then turned to slam his staff into Nero's stomach and then followed up with an uppercut to his face.

Each turtle knew it was time. They took out the little squirt guns that Donnie had put the retro mutagen in (Raph wondered if his younger brother could have found something more embarrassing to do this with, maybe water balloons courtesy of Dr. Prankenstein) and they each released the retro mutagen at the dazed rats.

"Shows over Rat King." Mikey declared triumphantly. "Now to take you down and make you change your name." He looked about ready to do a victory dance.

Raph was about to slap his orange masked younger brother upside the head when Donnie gasped. "Um, guys. I recommend we don't start celebrating things just yet." They all turned to him and then saw what the purple masked turtle was talking about. The four rat mutants were standing up, seemingly unaffected by the retro mutagen they were just hit with.

"Ah, sewer bunnies." Raph muttered as he dropped the squirt gun and drew his sais.

"Donnie?" Mikey asked, not looking forward to the upcoming retaliation, even without the rats having weapons.

"I don't know." Donnie confessed but moved on to hypothesize, "But as I said before we left the lair these guys were kind of double mutated as they were made from the serum that Rat King developed prior to stealing the knowledge of how we came to be from Master Splinter."

"Does that mean we just used up our trump card?" Leo asked reluctantly as he drew his katana blades again and prepared for combat.

"If you did then it seems to me you just lost." Rat King stated gleefully. "I'd say this game has just become mine."

Can the Mutanimals and the turtle's allies stop the Kraang without the turtles? Can the turtles stop the rat mutants if the retro mutagen has failed? Is this Rat King's final gambit or our heroes? The adventure continues.


	38. Preventative Measures Part 2

Leo: Myra does not own TMNT or anything you see on the show. Anything else is a different matter.

"I think we've got a problem dudes." Mikey said as the rat mutants were now up and taking a fighting stance. "We were actually kind of better off when these guys were armed and dangerous instead of unarmed and dangerous."

"Stand your ground my sons." Splinter declared. "They may have the knowledge to beat you in a direct fight but an opportunity will present itself."

"If only that opportunity was a chance to make these things normal." Raph commented and then snapped, "Oh, wait. We tried that and if failed."

"Enough Raph." Leo intervened. "This isn't Donnie's fault or anyone else's. We just have to make the best of this situation."

With that the rat mutants attacked and the turtle's moved to defend themselves. It was difficult because the rat mutant's made sure to use the moves that the brothers were not familiar with though they knew if they didn't defeat the turtle's then they would soon figure out their own ways to adapt to the attacks.

Rat King was enjoying the fact his warriors were getting the upper hand against the turtle's though he was a bit dismayed that Splinter didn't seem too bothered by it, having confidence in his sons abilities. "Your hope is futile my brother." He said to the rat master. "The turtles have lost."

"They say not to count your chickens before they hatch." Splinter responded. "We have not lost yet."

Granitor shot fire at Leatherhead and the mutant alligator it even as he ran right into Tragg's oncoming fist. Slash moved it to attack Traag but was blocked and then hit by the molten rock monster.

"Those rock dudes are bogus." Mondo remarked. "How do we stop them?"

April racked her brain but came up with nothing. This wasn't Dimension X and there were no bam rocks as Mikey had called them in order to even stop them. "I think all we can do is hope that Slash and Leatherhead can smash them or something." She said.

"You're done freaks." They heard Kraang Subprime say from behind the Kraang droids. Standing right by him, back in his bulky droid himself was Kraang Commando. "Surrender now or face a painful end."

As if to emphasize the point the Kraang droids started to shoot at the group. April, Karai, Jennifer and Aaliyah were doing the best they could to block the laser blasts. Rockwell made his way to be just in front of everyone save for the two large mutants fighting the rock creatures and did his best to create a psychic shield to deflect the attacks as well.

"Let's see what the Kraang think of this." Casey declared as he dropped three hockey pucks with lit cherry bombs taped on them. He then proceeded to shoot them as far as he could into the Kraang army with a loud, "Goongala!" They landed in random places and before they could react to it they exploded and sent several of the Kraang droids into the scrap heap.

Karai glanced around and then looked to the other girls. "O'Neill, if you and Jennifer could give Aaliyah and I boost maybe we could get over the wall and take out some of the droids from behind, and deal with both of those bigmouthed Kraang." She said.

The red head glanced at the kunoichi, then at the Kraang's and then at the wall again. "We can hook our hands together and give you an aerial start over the wall." She replied.

"I think it'd be better if Candy and I do that." Mondo interjected as he had to reach out his tongue and lick his eyeballs. "You two need to help Rockwell keep those laser blasts off of us." April and Karai had to concede that was a good point.

"Sounds good." Karai replied and looked to Aaliyah. "Ready?" She asked.

Aaliyah nodded. "Let's do it." She agreed. Candy got on one knee and cupped her hands together as Mondo used his tail to pick up the skateboard and then followed the axolotl girl's movements. The two kunoichi then took a small jog over to them and placed their right feet into the lizard mutant's outstretched hands. The two of them sent their arms up and the two girls flying, who expertly grasped the edge of the wall and then leapt over it.

"Cowabunga." Mondo stated happily.

"This would go so much better if we could get past those rock creeps." April mused.

"We're working on it." Slash promised the small red headed kunoichi. He swung his mace at Granitor and struck him but it didn't seem to do much. "These things are harder than the average rock."

"If they're that hard on the outside, maybe it would be easier to destroy them from inside." Renet suggested from her position at the back of the line with Candy and Mondo.

"How do we do that?" Jennifer asked the apprentice time mistress as she blocked a couple of laser blasts with her batons. "Are we supposed to shrink to small size and get in their stomachs?"

"Of course not." Renet responded. "But if Casey can make them eat a puck or something like that."

"That could work." Casey agreed. "Except I don't know if the cherry bomb would be strong enough."

"That might not be a concern." Rockwell replied. "They seem to be belching some sort of flammable material, be it fire or lava, and that might set them to ignite before it gets far enough to be nothing more than minor damage."

"There's only one way to know." April said to Casey. "As soon as Leatherhead and Slash have them in a good position, give it a shot."

Casey picked out two pucks and got ready to light them. "Your right Red, let's give this a shot." He declared.

"Let's see what we can do about getting these guys set up then." Slash said to Leatherhead who nodded in agreement as they started toward the two rock creatures again.

While the two giant mutant reptiles engaged the rock creatures again Karai and Aaliyah stealthily approached the back of the Kraang army. Karai took out the legs of the back army with her tonta while Aaliyah used her bunrei's to take out the back of the legs and the 'kneecap' of the next two rows in front.

"What is this?" Kraang Subprime demanded. "We put a wall up to prevent you little pests from showing up and you still find your way back here?" He shook his small pink head. "You're like cockroaches."

"Like you and your little brain freaks should talk." Karai snapped back. "I mean come on, father…and I don't mean the Shredder, said you got crushed in the lair and Leo said you were blown up in Dimension X and yet here you are."

"Think you're so clever huh?" Kraang Subprime responded and shot his lasers at the kunoichi. She dodged several of them with a roll to the left away from the other Kraang and her allies and then began to weave a path toward the big mouthed eye patched pink blob.

"I'm going to tear you into pieces and send you back to your brothers as multiple presents." Kraang Commando said with a gleeful look in his eyes as he approached the lone female turtle.

"They're not my brothers." Aaliyah retorted. "And the only one who will be in pieces is you." Kraang Commando tried to slam his fist down on her and she back flipped away and then kicked it him in the jaw though it didn't do much to his bio droid. "Damn it." She muttered.

The turtles were finding it hard to go to face to face with the mutant rats. They had sheathed their weapons but the problem was the rats knew what Splinter knew and they did not.

"Man we can't even try a double team effect or switch partners." Raph noted as he barely dodged a punch from Claudius. "We've got to come up with something before they get the drop on us." He didn't want to point out he could feel his ankle nagging at him from his injury when trying to break into Shredder's lair to get a mind control worm for Donnie.

"I know." Leo said simply as he tried to dodge an attack from Caligula. His leg was nagging him a little, the same one that had been injured by Shredder and his minions as the Kraang had invaded New York for the second time.

Mikey jumped out of Commodus's way and then landed behind him, but got smacked by the tail. "Dude, this is not going well." The orange masked turtle noted just before he had to stop the tail from wrapping around his throat.

"Enough games." Rat King stated. "Destroy them my rat warriors."

"This was a game?" Donnie asked incredously.

"Where are our extra lives?" Mikey asked which drew a sigh from Raph even though he had to admit in this case he wasn't entirely sure he could disagree.

The rat warriors began to approach the slightly battered turtles when all of a sudden they faltered, seemingly dazed for a moment. They tried to shake it off but after another couple of steps they faltered again and kneeled down on one knee each.

"What?" Rat King questioned. "What is going on here?"

"Donnie?" Leo asked his purple masked brother.

The smart member of the team thought only a moment before drawing his conclusion. "It has to be a delayed reaction to the retro mutagen as a result of the formula Rat King used to try to use. Since its not pure mutagen it took a while to kick in." He revealed.

Rat King moved to fade into the shadows of the park but he only got a couple of steps before he found himself face to face with Splinter. "It's over Rat King." He declared. "You have lost your warriors." As if proving the ninja master's point the rats let out roars that gradually turned into squeaks as they demutated, not into the large rat beasts they were beforehand but the small rats they had started out life as. When Rat King got ready to once again flee Splinter lashed out with a chop to him that sent him flying across the battle field.

"Wow, awesome." Mikey murmured.

"Impressive." Donnie agreed. The four turtles then turned to deal with the Rat King only to find that he had vanished. There was no sign of him.

Splinter had noticed that as well and with a sigh he said, "Come my sons. We must get to the Jersey base to help our friends before the Kraang invade and we have another repeat of the last one." The five of them headed toward the Party Wagon.

Casey waited impatiently as Slash and Leatherhead worked to subdue Traag and Granitor so he could hope to deliver the coup de grace. To make matters worse Red, Jen and Rockwell were starting to feel the strain of stopping the laser blasts. Mondo and Candy had tried to move in closer to deal with the Kraang droids but the rock monsters were making it impossible. They even were able to keep an eye on the sky to stop Pidgeon Pete from getting in any sky attacks.

Karai and Aaliyah were too busy dealing with the Kraang sub leaders to cull that number down any.

Slash slammed his mace into Traag's face and then tackled him hard. He moved behind much quicker than one could expect from a large mutant and twisted one of the creature's arms behind its back. He made sure to position the creature for the vigilante and make sure the Kraang couldn't snipe him.

Leatherhead was in a wrestling match and he reared back and slammed his skull into Granitor. He then took those arms and flipped the rock creature of his massive form before slamming him into the ground hard. He then literally sat on top of him and lifted his head in the same direction as Casey.

Casey lit the fuses and dropped the hockey pucks on the ground before releasing two quick slap shots that resulted in two hockey pucks into the rock creature's mouths. The two massive mutants released their temporarily subdued opponents and they rose immediately.

"Um, where's the boom?" Casey asked.

"That should have worked." Renet said. "At least I think it should have."

"Isn't that a bad time to mention the think part of a plan?" Pete questioned.

"Looks like we're back to plan b." Slash said to Leatherhead. The two mutants were about to charge them again when the rock creatures were getting to release flame and lava from their mouths respectively. As they moved to do so it was like something fractured and the rock creatures exploded into fragments.

"Better late than never I suppose." Leatherhead said. "Now we should turn our attention to the Kraang."

The Kraang increased their attacks with the rock creatures no longer acting as frontrunners for the distraction as the Mutanimals, Casey, April and Jennifer started toward them.

Karai found her best weapon against Kraang Subprime was her agility as she was able to dodge each of his attacks. The downside was that she was unable to inflict much damage with her small sword against such a huge metallic opponent.

Aaliyah likewise was having difficulties as her opponent didn't need to be in as many mechanical pieces since Kraang Commando's infiltration form wasn't that of a teenage girl but still had the strength to back up his attacks.

The female turtle dodged a punch aimed to put her in the ground but she dodged it and the used her bunrei's to chop that arm off of his body and then delivered a kick to his chest. "These things are made a lot sturdier than the average Kraang droid." She noted annoyed.

"You think that one has a sturdy frame?" Karai questioned with subtle amusement as she dodged more laser blasts from Kraang Subprime. "This one thinks he's the next empire state building."

"Mock while you can traitor." Kraang Subprime said as he reached out a massive hand to grasp Karai but the kunoichi jumped over the attempted grab and stabbed her tonta into his arm for whatever that seemed to be worth.

"Kraang!" Leatherhead bellowed as he then launched himself into Kraang Subprime and slammed right into the large combat droid. Karai turned to see that they had thinned out a hole in the diminishing army that had been the Kraang blockade.

Candy recovered a couple of the lasers from the fallen Kraang droids and she turned them on a few Kraang droids before she then turned and started to unleash blast after blast at Kraang Commando. He seemed confused as to who should get his focus; the female axolotl mutant blasting him with lasers or the female turtle mutant basically right in his face. The diversion was enough as Aaliyah leapt and delivered the bunrei into her right hand right into the head of the droid and as the power started to be lost in the system she solidified it by taking off its head. The droid fell to the ground.

"Piece of cake." Candy said as she started to turn to Kraang Subprime.

Aaliyah knew otherwise. "The fight isn't over yet." She declared.

Sure enough Kraang Commando emerged from the broken husk of a droid only to turn around and grow into the large tentacled form that so far only he could do out of the entire Kraang species.

"Never seen that one before." They heard Slash say.

"Nor have I." Leatherhead added.

The large Kraang jumped at Aaliyah before she could react and it slammed her into the ground hard. She felt her head strike the pavement and for just a moment felt as if she were going to black out. Only her shell had saved her from having possibly having a broken back. It roared at her and moved to bite her head off of her body.

"NO!" April shouted and she meant to throw her tessen at him but instead she had unconsciously tapped into her psychic powers, sending several Kraang droids flying away from her, Casey and Jennifer and on top of it Kraang Commando went flying into one of the walls.

"Impressive." Rockwell stated.

Leatherhead took the arm that Karai had dug her tonta into and pulled it from Kraang Subprime's body before starting to beat his opponent with said arm. Under other circumstances the kunoichi may have been amused.

Suddenly they saw a Kraang portal open and out flew one of their stealth ships. "The invasion." Jennifer gasped. "I think its beginning."

"You're too late." Kraang Subprime declared ecstatically. "That stealth ship is just the first of many that will soon emerge. We will lay enough destruction on this city to force its unconditional surrender."

"Red, can you and Jennifer do anything about that?" Casey asked and was disappointed when both girls shook their heads.

Renet smiled. "I think they can do something about it." She said. "Which also means they must have stopped Rat King and his mutants."

They saw the Party Wagon coming straight for the facility.

"What's the plan Donnie?" Raph asked his smartest brother as they sped toward the base and the stealth ship.

"I've added a bit of a surprise to the Party Wagon since we ended their last invasion, with some suggestions from Renet." Donnie answered his older brother though in truth he wished they had been able to bring the Turtle Mech with them. He pressed a button and from the roof of the Party Wagon a large laser cannon emerged. Then with a press of a button launched the laser cannon at the stealth ship. It struck it and it started to smoke and lose balance.

"Wow." Renet said happily. "Mikey was right, Donnie was able to get the laser cannon installed into the Party Wagon." She had to suggest that after knowing it tended to do so well for some ninja turtles in other timelines she had heard about; and advantage to being a time master or mistress…even if she was only in training.

Karai gave what could be considered a rather wicked grin. "Hey Rockwell, give our little friend here a good push, would you?" She requested.

Rockwell hesitated only an instant to determine the kunoichi's plan but then nodded. "Brilliant idea." He said. He used a burst of psychic power that shoved Kraang Subprime hard and made him sprawl further into the facility.

The Party Wagon shot the laser cannon again even as Leo slammed into several Kraang droids as they headed straight toward the facility that Donnie estimated to be the command center.

The stealth ship lost balance again and started to fall toward the ground. Kraang Subprime stood up again. "I'm going to make you regret that monkey, right after I make your alligator friend and the girl into Swiss cheese."

Leatherhead growled and was about to go at him again but Karai stopped him with her arm in front of his stomach, which was about as far as she could reach. Both alien and mutant were confused for a moment until a shadow fell over Kraang Subprime. He looked up just in enough time to have the stealth ship crash down on top of him and his droid body. It caused a couple other buildings to collapse, including the one that Kraang Commando had been crashed into thanks to Aprils' telekinetic powers.

"Stay gone this time." Karai shouted out to the wreckage.

The Mutanimals weren't far behind the Party Wagon as they barreled right into the command center. "We must stop the ones called the turtles and the ones called the Mutanimals from preventing the ones known as the Kraang from what is called coming through the portal." One of them stated.

"It'd be nice if these things could speak proper English." Candy noted as she blasted at another one with a laser.

Aaliyah jumped up and slammed her bunrei into the skull of the Kraang droid who had spoken before turning to another that was operating a console and took that one out too. "How do we shut this thing down?" She asked.

The Party Wagon door opened and the turtles and Splinter joined the fight for the command center that the Kraang were already quickly losing. Donnie ran over to the control panel and started to fiddle around with it. "Come on." He murmured.

"Want some help D?" Mikey asked. "You have the Dimension X god here after all."

Donnie shot him an irritated look. "I got it."

"You better hurry Donatello." Rockwell stated as he deflected laser blasts back at some Kraang droids. "There is another stealth ship that is starting to emerge."

The purple masked turtle pressed a few buttons and then exclaimed, "I got it!" As he pressed another and the portal shut down, cutting the new stealth ship off a quarter of the way through.

"Take that Kraang, Booyakasha." Mikey stated and stared to do a victory dance.

"This isn't over yet Mikey." April reminded him as she took out a Kraang droid herself. "We still have some Kraang here."

"Oh, yeah." The orange masked turtle commented as he got back to the battle.

"Set this place to blow Donnie." Slash called out as he used his mace to smash aside a few Kraang droids of his own.

"Already on it." Donnie replied as he was setting out to do just that. Another moment passed before he called out, "Time to evacuate the premise everyone."

"We'll cover your retreat." Leo said to Renet after taking out a Kraang droid. "Take Master Splinter and everyone else home through that doorway; we'll meet you at the lair."

Renet hesitated only an instant before nodding. "Okay." She said and then looked to the time scepter. "I know this isn't time travel but we really need to get back to the lair, so be a good scepter and please help us, okay?"

"Yeah, please." Pete echoed from beside her. Rockwell rolled his eyes but kept his peace.

Renet used the time scepter to open another door similar to the time door and then looked to the others. "Time to see if the fates smile on us again." She said. Everyone looked just a bit nervous about it but Aaliyah, the Mutanimals, and their human allies followed the apprentice time mistress followed by Splinter seconds later.

Once the door closed Leo looked to his brothers. "Time to go, guys." He announced. The four turtles headed toward the Party Wagon and they ran some Kraang droids on their way out. Of Kraang Subprime and Kraang Commando there was no sign.

Raph swore he heard a Kraang say, "This is known as not good." Then they had left and moments later there was a huge explosion, followed by several more explosions.

"Another Kraang facility bites the dust." Mikey said happily. "Oh yeah." He started doing dance moves from the waist up and then got smacked in the back of the head from Raph when he accidently elbowed him in the shoulder.

About twenty minutes later they parked the Party Wagon and came into the lair where they found their friends waiting for them. April ran over and threw her arms over Donnie, who lifted her a little in his own embrace. "You made it." The red head sighed happily.

"Wouldn't miss anything like this for my life." Donnie replied.

Mikey had Renet come up to him and she placed her hands gently on his chest as she said, "I'm glad you guys made it out of there. If you didn't have the Party Wagon we never would have left without you."

The orange masked turtle smiled. "It's all good Renet." He said.

Aaliyah came over to Leo but stopped herself from hugging him as she wasn't sure what he would think about that. "About time you made it home." She teased instead.

"We took the scenic route." Leo remarked good naturedly. The two turtle's fist bumped lightly as friends sometimes tend to do though that only elicited an amused giggle from Candy and look of annoyance from Aaliyah.

Jennifer started to run over to Raph. The red masked turtle opened his arms and started toward her, he ended up catching her and as they embraced he twirled her around in his arms for a moment. "I'm so glad you're okay." Jennifer said as she kissed him passionately on the lips.

"I'm glad you're okay." Raph told the blonde as he set her down on her feet lightly and then ran his two large fingers through her long blonde hair. "We were just playing exterminator; you were the ones going in to stop the Kraang's invasion."

"That may be." Slash stated as he came over to the turtles. "But we still couldn't have done it without you. We gotta get ourselves a vehicle or two." He looked to Raph. "I promise you brother; I wouldn't have let anything happen to your girl."

Raph smiled at his former pet. "I know you wouldn't man." He replied.

"Maybe between Rockwell and I we can see what we can do about getting you some wheels." Donnie suggested as he released April from their embrace, though the two still kept close.

"Sounds like a good idea." Rockwell agreed.

"Father told us what happened." Karai said to her brothers. "Sounds like we missed a decent fight of our own, not that we didn't make up for it. I'm glad the retro mutagen worked."

"Despite the delay." Casey added with a teasing smile at Donnie.

"Does that mean the rat mutants are gone for good?" Aaliyah asked them.

Leo frowned a bit. "I'd like to say yes, but around here…well who knows." He answered.

"Are you kidding me?" Mikey asked with a laugh. "Those rat mutants are gone, history. We'll never ever see them again."

"And Falco?" Rockwell asked. "Master Splinter told us he had gotten away."

"I am afraid he will resurface sooner or later." Splinter agreed softly. "We can only hope to be prepared when that time comes."

At the battle site in Central Park the four rats that had previously been dangerous warriors had retreated under a bush. As the shadows grew deeper, if one were looking far enough two glowing colors could be seen; eight small beady red eyes and four slightly green glowing bodies…

When will the Rat King resurface? Are the rat mutants really gone? What will the Kraang do now? What's next for our heroes? The adventure continues.


	39. Karai and Casey

Raph: Doesn't own TMNT, if it's on show it's already taken. Only OC's are owned, not that it will matter in this story too much.

Leo: Raph…

Karai: Well it's true this time. Go ahead Myra.

A/N: As Casey was not featured in the new episode Creeping Doom and we all know the difference between Karai's position in show and in my story, I'm going to start my couple's miniseries here. That means this will take place during the events of the episode Creeping Doom.

Karai stood by the turnstile as Casey talked to the others. Raph turned to his oldest sister and said, "You know you two are going to miss practice, right?" He asked.

The kunoichi laughed. "I know more about ninjitsu than you, I can handle one missed training session." She said. Raph gave her a mock glare and then shrugged with amusement.

"You guys just be careful." April said.

"We'll be fine." Aaliyah promised the red head as she brushed the longer piece of her white mask off of her shoulder. "Jennifer and I are just going to do some exercises only a few hours from here, we'll be back by dinner time."

Leo nodded. "Just be sure to keep you and Jennifer safe." He said to the white masked turtle who in all truth was pretty much at the same skill level as he was. "You never know who might be coming for us next."

"We've got to get groceries if we want dinner." Casey reminded them. "All you've got down here is…basically nothing. Not even frozen pizzas."

Mikey perked up at that one. "Then you better get going," He implored as he looked to get ready to beg. "We need to have our pizzas."

Jennifer kissed Raph on his cheek. "We'll be back soon." She said.

"Can't wait." Raph said as he stroked her hair and her cheek. The blonde then went to Aaliyah and the girls left the lair.

"We should be getting going to Jones." Karai called out. She was impatient to get going, the truth was as much as she was getting to love her father and even her brothers, she hated being cooped up. She didn't know how Jennifer could stand being down here for days on end.

"See ya, Raph. Red. Guys." Casey said as he descended the steps and started out of the turnstiles. As they left the two could hear Mikey say he was going to get Donnie for practice and they both exchanged looks, knowing that meant he would harass the purple masked turtle in his lab, possibly annoying him.

"Hope he doesn't break anything." Karai commented. Only later would she learn how prophetic that statement would really be.

A few minutes later the two reached the surface, Karai was surprised to see Casey hold the manhole cover up until she had gotten onto the street level. With a small grunt he dropped it. "A little heavy there Jones?" She joked.

Casey shrugged. "A little." He relented. He had his hockey mask in his jacket pocket though he wore no face paint.

Karai shook her head in amusement. "So how did you get involved with this anyway?" She asked as they walked down the sidewalk. "I mean you're not a mutant yourself, you're not the child of a mutant like me, you're not someone who was rescued from mutants like Jennifer, you weren't forced into this like Aaliyah or Candy and you're not some by product involved with the situation like O'Neil, so how did that happen?"

Casey wondered if he should be slightly insulted at the way both she and April had been just above tolerating each other since the red headed girl and his best friends blonde girlfriend had psychically removed the mind control worm from the kunoichi but figured he should leave well enough alone, let them work out whatever issues they had. "Actually it was because of Red." He said.

"Oh?" Karai questioned though she felt a little bit annoyed that again things seemed to revolve around April.

Casey nodded. "Yeah. See, I needed a trig tutor and I was given Red." He explained. "At first, I was like she's smart and okay, she's pretty. But after the right part of my mind takes over it's like it's no biggie. Nice girl but the world's full of that."

"So what changed then?" Karai asked him; fully aware that the vigilante had a huge crush on April and in truth still did have some feelings for her even though both of them had known that Donnie had basically won that semi competition for the red head's heart.

"I was walking Red home after a study session and we got jumped by that thing that Donnie keeps in that lab, Mutagen Man I think." Casey answered. "And I try to attack it and it tosses me. I'm trying to recover and I see her going at it and kicking its butt wit that Tessen fan thingy and I have to admit I like what I saw."

"Beautiful, unassuming and deadly." Karai remembered saying to April when she had fought her in order to take her to Shredder so they could presumably give her to the Kraang. "At least in the right hands. O'Neil's gotten a lot more skilled with that since I first fought her." She admitted.

They entered the grocery store they did their shopping at since it was pretty close so it was easy to take food from there to the lair and make the trips out. It'd been that way since April had met the turtles and everyone else that could do it kept to that route.

"Not long after Red comes to ice skating rink to hang out. I ask if she has any other friends and she, in a roundabout way, tells me about the turtles by saying she had four friends that she didn't talk to after something happened." Casey told her.

"The mutation thing that happened to her dad." Karai surmised.

Casey nodded. "Yep." He confirmed. "I had a friend named Nick, we played hockey together. Big game comes about and I accidently busted up his face when I was going for a winning goal. He never spoke to me again." He tried to shrug it off non commitally but the kunoichi could see it in the vigilante's eyes that it still hurt. "Somethings are just beyond our control." He added quietly.

Karai reached out and gently took his hand, squeezing it softly. "Yeah, a lot of life is. But that wasn't your fault and if he wants to hold you accountable then he's the moron." She stated.

"Thanks Karai." Casey said softly. "Anyway, Red took that comment to heart and made up with the guys. After the Mutagen Man thing and the Footbots at the arena," At that point he gave Karai a smirk. "Of which I'm pretty sure you had a hand in." The kunoichi shrugged non chalantly but certainly didn't deny it. "I started the vigilante routine and ran into Raph when dealing with Purple Dragon losers. Followed him to the lair the next night and saw all four turtles, then out comes Splinter and Red and I learn their secret."

"I'm not really sure what that kind of feeling is like." Karai admitted. "The way I grew up there really was no such thing as friends. It was all about training to be ready for whatever the Foot had to do. Shredder does have activities outside of New York after all."

"I know Japan at the least." Casey noted. "How much of that do you know about, I mean prior to you quitting and all?"

"Quite a bit actually though I don't know what's going on with that since coming to New York." Karai answered.

They had collected a cart and were picking up some cereal and pop tarts. Casey pushed as Karai got most of it and they continued to talk. "I never questioned what Shredder did growing up." Karai said. "It just wasn't done in general, plus on top of it I thought he was my father so…"

"I get that." Casey promised. "I rarely question my dad and my sister never does."

"Your dad isn't Shredder though." Karai pointed out.

"Nope." Casey conceded easily. "But one thing universal about parents, regardless of whether it's my dad, Splinter, Mr. O'Neil and even Shredder is that parents aren't always right even if they want to think so."

"I hate Shredder for lying to me all these years, for killing my mother, for denying me my true father and for denying me my brothers." Karai admitted but blushed just a bit. "Except I wouldn't have brothers if Shredder hadn't done what he did and for what little it is worth he did raise me. That's not something that goes away, as Raphael has pointed out to anyone in earshot at one point."

The vigilante understood at that moment that the kunoichi was confessing something to him that he was sure she had never confessed to anyone except possibly herself. "But Raph has changed that opinion." Casey pointed out. "And you're changing how you see the world, which is different from what Shredder taught you. You're smart enough now to know to take the good with the bad, use what works for you and discard the rest." Naturally then next area they headed toward was the ramen area, the second staple around the lair besides pizza.

"It's not always easy." Karai confessed. "You know, on the roof of Shredder's lair when Hector bragged about the fact he had hurt Jennifer, I wanted to make him suffer before killing him."

"No offense, but I didn't think you really liked her." Casey said.

"She takes some getting used to. I didn't grow up with siblings, girl friends or really even any friends. I haven't figured out how to deal with how Jennifer and Aaliyah and even Renet are like around each other." Karai replied with a small shrug. "But, back on topic, I don't have to like her to be outraged at him hurting her. I don't know exactly what he did to her but based on his face and hers I have some suspicions."

"I kind of get that." Casey admitted. "I see how my sister is sometimes with her friends and I just don't get it. Friendship is different between guys and girls after all."

They picked up as many pizzas as they could fit in half the cart. They knew the register operator would look at them funny but they knew that around the lair it would go very quickly. They also took the opportunity to grab some ice cream that they could eat, since Ice Cream Kitty was not edible. Then they went to get milk and whipped cream since Mikey liked to use that to play with said kitty cat.

They were heading toward the soda aisle when they heard the doors open. Out of habit both of them looked to the door to see who it was and in this case it was a good thing they did as in walked Fong, Tsoi and Sid the three constant members of the Purple Dragons. Casey was sure that Hun had to be not too far behind.

Just as both of them suspected they immediately went up to the register and started to harass the cashier to give them the money. "We should stop them." Karai said.

Casey nodded. "Yep, just remember we can't use weapons in here. Too close and too easy to do damage." He said. Not that it mattered since he didn't have his.

"You think?" Karai asked sarcastically and the vigilante shrugged in surrender. What he didn't know was that using her tonta wasn't an option for the kunoichi. At Splinter's request she had consented to leave it when she was leaving the lair unless it was for patrol or a mission. Still, as her father would also remind her and her brothers anything could be used as a weapon and a ninja is never truly defenseless.

The two of them approached the register. The clerk was trying to signal them to leave the store so they could avoid the Purple Dragons but Karai called out, "Isn't this when you guys should tell him rather you want paper or plastic?"

They both turned to the sound. They weren't sure who Karai was but they knew exactly who Casey was. "It's the vigilante again." Fong stated.

"At least he doesn't have those turtle freaks with him." Sid stated.

"Let's get them." Tsoi said and three gang members started toward Karai and Casey.

"Heh, without Hun here this is like clearing a video game on easy." Casey said as he got ready to fight them.

Karai had to concede that these three were hardly a challenge. Even Hun, while being a challenge, was someone she could most likely defeat. Tsoi tried to punch Karai in the face but she expertly dodged it and kicked him in the back of his right leg.

Casey was facing both Fong and Sid but he was easily avoiding them. While he didn't have his weapons with him he got a hold of two plastic dividers that could be used to divide customer orders on registers which he could easily use like mini baseball bats.

"Stand still." Sid commanded Casey as he tried to smash his fist into the vigilante's face. Casey of course didn't do so as he dodged the attack and then slammed one of the plastic dividers into the man's stomach.

The door was forced open and the leader of the Purple Dragons started to demand, "What is taking so…" But his question was stopped when he saw the situation, with Tsoi going after a girl he swore was Shredder's errant daughter and the other two going after the hockey boy vigilante.

Hun released a flying kick that sent Casey sprawling into a display of chips. He looked to Sid and Fong. "Help Tsoi to wrangle the girl. Shredder may pay handsomely for her return." As the two wandered over he looked to Casey. "I'll keep hockey boy under wraps."

Casey laughed. "You think you can get something for turning Karai in? The last two morons who tried that ended up with rough skin and horns." He replied as he thought of Bebop and Rocksteady, whom Raph had told him were humans who were mutated in punishment for capturing Karai.

The kunoichi saw the other two Purple Dragons and laughed. "You three for one girl?" She taunted and laughed. "Want to invite a few more of you losers to even try to make this even?"

All three of them tried at once to move in and get their hands on her but Karai back flipped out of the way and the three of them flopped the grab. She then delivered a spinning kick that got them all in the face hard.

Hun was going at Casey and he was doing his best to block and dodge but without any real weapons at his disposal he was finding it hard to deal with the dragon leader. Karai noticed this too and as the three again tried to go after her the kunoichi leap frogged over them and ended her landing with a kick to Hun's side.

"I can take him." Casey tried to say.

"Sure, Jones." Karai replied with a slight snicker. "You get the three goons; it's almost a challenge for you without your weapons. I'll deal with Hun."

Casey gave her a slightly irritated look but privately knew the kunoichi was right and he ran to intercept the three dragon minions as Karai turned to face the leader. "Let's try this again Hun." Karai said as she took a fighting stance. "I don't need a weapon to beat you."

"You are too overconfident girl." Hun replied simply and then he started to after her. The two of them clashed but neither one was really getting over the other, in part because each of them had a limited amount of space to work with.

As the two were fighting the Purple Dragons something odd started to happen, the store began to shake. The counter person gave a bit of a yelp and then ran toward the back. Casey and the three minions lost their balance and even Hun was a little shaken up. Only Karai remained unaffected and that was only because she had felt the vibrations coming due to the mutant snake half of her and had braced her feet wide apart to compensate for it.

"Another earthquake?" Fong questioned, referring to the last earthquakes that had occurred because of the Kraathatrogon.

"Impossible." Karai said since she and Casey knew about that incident. Then she looked to the vigilante. "Right?"

"Got me." Casey admitted as he started to stand up.

The three other dragons started to stand up too. From the folds of his vest Tsoi produced something that Casey had never seen him produce before, nor had any of the turtles ever mentioned it if they had seen it, he produced a handgun. "Damn it." He muttered.

Karai had not seen it as she was getting ready to fight Hun again. Casey opened his mouth to shoot a warning to the kunoichi but before he could get the words out Tsoi fired the gun. The popping of the hand weapon did attract Karai's attention and she did her best to jump to the left but the truth was no ninja training was quicker than a speeding bullet.

The vigilante however did notice that she brought her left hand up and formed the body of the snake that she had when she had been a full mutant snake and when she had been attacking them under Shredder's influence. Karai fell back, leaving a trail of blood as she hit the edge of the freezer hard.

"Karai!" Casey gasped in alarm as he threw one of the plastic dividers into Tsoi's hand hard enough to make him drop it. He then slammed through all of three of them to get to Karai's side and even slid under a vicious high kick from Hun.

"We are taking her hockey boy." Hun told him as they started to approach, but then out of the corner of his eye he noticed that a smoky green gas was seeping in through the doors. "Forget it, we have to leave. Now." He barked at the three dragons and they ran the same way the clerk had.

"What do I do now?" Casey wondered. He didn't know what the green gas was but he wasn't going to leave Karai, nor was he going to move her if she was gravely injured.

"We need to get away from it." Karai said to him with only a small grunt. She let her snake hand revert back to normal and the bullet fell to the ground. It had cut through her arm and she still bled but she had done it in such a way that as a human the bullet went through cleanly. "I'll live and hopefully Jennifer can heal it later. Even if she can't it'll heal on its own."

Casey still moved to Karai's side and took her uninjured arm and led her to the back. They sat on the floor to catch their breaths until the smoke caught up with them again. The vigilante noticed a clean towel and took it into his hands and started to tear it up to staunch the bleeding and make her a tourniquet until they could be sure she would be alright. "That was some good thinking." He told her.

Karai nodded. "I thought so." She said as she leaned her head against the wall. She let Casey work for a few minutes. "Looks good Jones. You're smarter than you like to admit, or act."

"Thanks, I think." Casey said with a small eye roll.

Karai laughed a bit. "So, remember when we first met?" She asked him.

Casey nodded. "Yep." He finished up the tourniquet. "I'd just seen The Six Deadly Poisons with Red. I was on my way home when you and the Footbots attacked me and we battled."

"You said you weren't sure if you wanted to fight me or ask me out." Karai said.

Casey nodded. "I've always had kind of a thing for bad girls, Red notwithstanding. She's not that." He replied.

"O'Neill is definitely not that." Karai agreed.

Casey felt a slight blush on his cheeks. "Then we fought and in order to poison me you kissed me straight on the lips. Which was kind of nice but so not the right time for it." He added.

"No, it wasn't." Karai agreed with a small nod. She then leaned forward and pressed her lips against Casey's, giving him the same kind of kiss she had given him that night. After a minute or so she pulled away. "But this was the right time." She said breathlessly.

Casey seemed stunned for a moment though a smile crossed his face. "Am…am I going to end up poisoned again?" he asked jokingly for lack of anything else to say.

The kunoichi shook her head. "Nope, at least I don't think so. I'm pretty sure I can control when I actually inject my venom through contact." She sighed a bit and laid her head back against the wall. "Getting shot hurts." She added.

Casey sat next to her now and wrapped an arm around her shoulder. "I'm sure it does." He said as she leaned her head against his arm. They waited for almost fifteen minutes like that for any signs of the green gas. Not long after that they saw the green smoke clear and five minutes later the door opened and they saw Jennifer's life form standing in the door way.

"There you are." The blonde said as she came in. "Raph called Aaliyah and I to find you two after what just happened." She landed across from Karai and Casey. "Are you okay Karai?"

The kunoichi hesitated just as second as being cared about was still a bit new to her. "The Purple Dragons were here." She finally answered. "One of them pulled a gun out and shot at me. I used my snake arm to take most of the force away from the bullet but it still got me."

"It's a clean one." Casey said. "At least I think so." He gently unwrapped Karai's arm so Jennifer could look at it. "So where's Aaliyah?"

"Outside in case someone was here that wasn't used to mutant turtles." Jennifer answered as she looked at it. "I think you're right Casey but I think Donnie should look at it to be sure before I try to heal the wound, we still don't know the extent of my powers. I'm going to have Aaliyah take Karai back to the lair. Casey and I will leave money for the food and then meet you there."

Both of them nodded in agreement though the blonde did notice Karai and Casey squeeze each other's hand gently before separating, just as she had seen Mikey and Renet do before. She had a feeling Casey was going to get over April sooner than anyone expected.

"So what happened anyway?" Casey asked as the three of them left the back room.

"Raph says they'll explain when we get back." Jennifer said.

Half an hour later Donnie had declared Karai's bullet wound as having been a clean shot and that Casey's quick actions in staunching the bleeding had helped her immensely. The groceries had been put away and they had put a couple of frozen lasagnas in the oven for dinner.

Raph sat with his arm around Jennifer's waist as she sat on his lap. Renet sat on the couch with Mikey on cross legged on the floor, his head laying against the apprentice time mistress's knee. Leo and Aaliyah sat together on the floor across from them. April had copied her friend's position with Donnie and like the blonde she had noticed that Karai and Casey were sitting closer to each other than they had ever been before. A small part of her wasn't sure how she felt about that since things with Karai were still in a delicate balance even while most of her was happy that her friend hadn't spent too much time brooding about losing the 'competition' for her affection.

Each of the turtle brothers took turns explaining to their missing friends what had happened that day, from the Creep getting loose again to a few drops of the brain worm serum landing on Donnie and making him lose his intelligence. From a retrospective point Donnie was more than happy to boast about the fact that April had done her part with the Shellraiser.

Renet likewise bragged about Mikey finding the solution to Donnie's temporary dumbness though she did conveniently forget to deal with the fact it was at least partially the orange masked turtle's fault to begin with.

They of course spoke about Creep taking a Snakeweed claw and making the 'Son of Snakeweed' as Mikey named him and their further merging into the 'Creep Weed', again courtesy of Mikey. "Now he's locked up tight in Donnie's lab in a lock enforced metal box."

"I don't think I understand why you brought it back to New York with you in the first place." Aaliyah said.

"Better with us where we can keep an eye on it, for the most part," Donnie started with a small glare at Mikey for messing with it in the first place. "Instead of being out where anyone can find it if they chose to trespass at April's farm house."

"Point taken." Aaliyah said.

"We have all had a long day." Splinter said from his position behind Casey and Karai. He had been worried about her since he had found out that she had been shot and that Shredder may have put a bounty on her return. "We should relax and rest."

"I'll get you when dinner is ready Master." Jennifer said to the rat.

"Thank you my dear." Splinter responded kindly to the young blonde as he started toward his room in the back of the dojo.

He had made it halfway through the dojo when he heard someone catching up to him and a moment later, "Master Splinter?" come from Casey Jones mouth.

The rat master turned to face him, looking intimidating. Like Jennifer and April he had noticed that ever since Casey and his daughter had returned something had changed between them. He had his suspicions and was sure the young vigilante was here to confirm that. "Yes, Mr. Jones." He said.

Casey looked rightfully nervous. "Um, I don't…don't normally do this…but I…well, I have to ask you something…about Karai…I mean I don't...wouldn't normally do this…but I…want to ask…" He stuttered.

Splinter gave a small smile. As her rightful father he had to make Casey squirm for this but he if he was correct about his assumptions at what he was aiming for the rat master had no problem giving the young man his consent to date Karai, if that was indeed her wish as well.

That's the first couple story. Next up is Raphael and Jennifer.


	40. Raphael and Jennifer

Mikey: Myra owns Jennifer and any other OC's that happen to show up in here, other than that TMNT is owned by Nickelodeon and anything seen on show is also owned.

"I don't know if I should call you brave or stupid Jones." Raph said to his human best friend as he sat on the couch with Casey Jones. "Having the guts to ask Splinter about dating Karai is kind of brave, but if he had said no by way of kicking your butt that would make you stupid."

"Hey watch what you say Raph." Casey replied with a smirk. "He did say yes and now I'm dating your older sister now." He gave a laugh and a wink. "Someday I might be your brother in law dude."

Raph rolled his eyes. "Yeah, like being a part of this family is everyone's dream." He drawled and then shrugged. "Nah, really you're part of the family Casey. Almost like a brother." The red masked turtle conceded.

"I think we're a long while away from worrying about it really." Casey said. "Even Donnie and April have been together longer." He then decided to change the subject. "So where are you and Jennifer going for your date?"

"It's not exactly a date, not the way I would think of it." Raph said. "But Jennifer says it's good enough and I'm not going to argue about it, especially since I'm a bit limited on my venues." He took a breath. "Jennifer is packing up the food for our picnic now and we're going to take the stealth cycle out to a place by the docks."

"Sounds cool to me." Casey admitted. "Might have to steal that one with Karai."

Raph gave him a semi mock glare. "Don't even think it. You have plenty of options on where you two can go." He replied.

Raph glanced to the left to see Leo and Aaliyah in their typical sparring session in the dojo. As much as the romance stuff sometimes made him gag (though nowhere near the way it used to before he met Jennifer) he wished Leo and Aaliyah would just fess up to the feelings they had for each other already, especially since Karai had already made her peace and moved on, now he thought Leo should do the latter himself. Not that it would have happened right at that point since Splinter was also in the dojo working with his daughter and half of their discussion; Karai.

He could make out Donnie and April in the lab, they were working on something though he didn't know what and didn't really care until such a point as it affected them all. He did however know it couldn't be that important or he wouldn't see them in the lab as they would have closed the door.

Mikey and Renet were watching TV, a repeat of Super Robo Mecha Force Team Five. Mikey was trying to provoke the apprentice time mistress into letting any cryptic comments slip loose about them being more than a TV show but whether it was true or not was anyone's guess because she was not falling for the orange masked turtle's attempts.

Jennifer came out of the kitchen and Raph couldn't help but stare. She had chosen to wear a tight red silk shirt that showed off her curves well and wore equally tight black jeans though that had been a decision of convenience rather than preference for a date considering the fact even a simple date could result in an attack. She had made sure her silky blonde hair was straight and flowing, just like the red masked turtle liked, and in truth she preferred it that way too. It felt more natural to her.

"Dude, you don't deserve that." Casey joked as he nudged Raph in the side before he got up to go watch Splinter train Karai.

"Ready?" Jennifer asked Raph.

It took a moment before he could respond. "Y-yeah. Let's get going." He said, making sure he had his sais just in case. He could see that Jennifer had stashed her batons in the picnic basket as opposed to being able to normally put them in the belt of her jeans, which the pair she was wearing now definitely didn't need one.

He led her to the stealth cycle and got in. Jennifer set the picnic basket in the very back where it would be secure on the way to the docks and then climbed in behind him. Both riders strapped on helmets, Raph with his slightly dented red helmet and Jennifer with brand new red and black helmet, almost as if she had collaborated her outfit with her helmet. Then they took off, easily using the entrance that the turtles used to get the Shellraiser and Party Wagon out of the tunnels.

In just under a half hour Raph parked the stealth cycle and the two of them got out. They left their helmets behind and Jennifer took out the picnic basket. They began to walk toward the docks. It was dark and relatively deserted but they still did their best to stick to the shadows.

"So is this your first date?" Raph asked her.

Jennifer nodded. "Yeah. Having a boyfriend around my father in itself would have been difficult. Hector being obsessed with me would make it impossible for me to have a boyfriend." She answered softly.

"You know one of these days I'm going to put that jerk down for good." Raph said.

"Try to make sure that putting him down doesn't require you to go with him." Jennifer replied softly. She was half afraid losing Raph would destroy her.

Raph laughed a little. "Like my brothers are going to let me fight him on my own when all is said and done." He pointed out.

"True enough." Jennifer agreed. "Which is a good thing when you consider that together we stopped a gang war and another Kraang invasion." She sighed a bit. "I always knew something was off with my father but…well, it's hard to think so poorly of a person who raised you."

"I guess that's true." Raph admitted. "I don't know sometimes how Karai does that."

"To an extent I don't know how much she does." Jennifer confided as they continued along. They could smell the ocean now. "I mean she loves Splinter and I think she cares about all of us. She really dislikes Shredder for what he did to her and Tang Shen but she hasn't completely forgotten him and what he did for her."

Part of Raph was not pleased with that possible revelation but as he had just admitted he could see why Karai would think that. "As long as she doesn't betray us to him or do something that Master Splinter wouldn't like I can live with that." He allowed.

They settled on a small dock area where Raph moved around a few boxes so they could sit by the water but also be obscured by anyone who was walking by unless they wanted to take a very close look at the area, in which case they would notice the proverbial onlooker beforehand.

Jennifer set her batons by her side as she took out some pizza bagels, some potato chips and a couple cans of soda. She knew it wasn't exactly the most romantic food in the world but she knew that was something Raph would eat and the truth was when it came to foods she had simple but varied tastes. She was never ate anything more extravagant than steak.

The red masked turtle laughed. "Is this your idea or mine?" He asked as he opened up the bag of potato chips.

Jennifer shrugged and smiled. "Mine pretty much." She answered as she took out the only actual romantic concessions, two candles that she lit and a red velvet cheesecake. "I'm not too big on the more…extravagant foods."

"No chocolate strawberries?" Raph asked her, that he knew was typically associated with romance.

"I don't like strawberries." Jennifer replied with another shrug. She did take out some whipped cream. "Though I do like how they smell, go figure."

Raph laughed as he opened the soda cans for both him and Jennifer. "Hey, everyone has their quirks. The only way Mikey eats peanuts is with crunchy peanut butter." He said.

"Aaliyah told me that her father doesn't eat onions, except for onion rings." She revealed. "It always made her think that was weird. And her mother doesn't like blue M&Ms."

Raph laughed. "So you don't like strawberries. Tell me something else about yourself." He requested.

Jennifer took a bite of the pizza bagel as she thought a moment. She swallowed and then revealed, "I hate grasshoppers." When Raph looked at her curiously she moved on to explain, "Back when my mother was alive we lived close to the place I went to elementary school at. One day I was walking home and crossed the grass to get to the door and from the grass a grasshopper jumped up, really high. It like flew past my face and I fell onto my back really hard. I was able to see what it was because it had jumped on a tree. From that point on it just freaked me out to see them."

Raph nodded in understanding. "I can't say that I have a reason like that and it's even a little weird considering we live in a sewer, but I've always hated cockroaches. I've worked through some of that though when Donnie made a spy roach to spy on the Kraang and it fell into some mutagen and it came after us because it held onto the fact I tried to kill it with one of my sai." He explained.

"I can't imagine why it felt that way." Jennifer teased with a smile before she rubbed his arm gently. "We all have our quirks, as you said."

"Casey hates rats." Raph added with a smirk.

Jennifer laughed at that one. "And he hangs out with four turtles whose father is a rat." She shook her head and smiled again. "Such irony. Though he must have hated the Rat King thing."

The two ate in companionable silence for a couple of minutes, enjoying each other's company and the smell of the ocean. The red masked turtle also swore he smelled strawberries from Jennifer's hair and had to admit it odd she could like the smell but not the taste.

Jennifer lifted her head as she gazed out into the ocean as if something had attracted her attention. Raph looked to her. "What's wrong?" He asked her.

"I thought I saw something in the water." Jennifer answered. "And I don't mean like a dolphin or anything like that."

Raph squinted his eyes but whatever his blonde girlfriend had seen seemed to be gone as he couldn't see anything. "Do you want to go back to the lair?" He asked her.

She shook her head. "No, maybe I'm just seeing things." She said. "It is pretty dark and all."

The couple tried to settle down to return to their meal when something burst from the water. When things settled down Raph saw the last thing he wanted to see; the blue and bloated maggot like form of Spy Roach or at least one very much like it.

"What is that?" Jennifer asked as she grabbed her baton and stood up.

"That would be the roach." Raph said as he withdrew his sais and did his best not to freak out as there were no brothers around to help out this time. "It mutated like that when it molted its skin. I thought I took it out though."

"Something must have happened, because here it comes." Jennifer gasped as Spy Roach made a dive bomb right at the two of them. Raph jumped into the water while she did a backwards cartwheel and then leapt onto one of the boxes they had placed around them to make a barrier of sorts.

Spy Roach turned quickly and made a sound that Jennifer could vaguely call a roar and then he dived right again at Jennifer. She timed her jump to jump right by him, slamming her booted feet into the mutant's back as she did so and then landed gracefully behind it as it hit the dock hard.

"Come on, stay down." Jennifer implored as she took out her batons and got ready for the next round even as it started to get up.

Spy Roach didn't seem inclined to listen and it turned to face her again. That was when Raph burst out of the water and jumped onto the things back, though a disgusted look did cross his face since he had to touch it. The Spy Roach twirled around though he wasn't able to dislodge the red masked turtle until slamming into the boxes and forcing Raph to release it.

"This isn't exactly what I had in mind for a date." Jennifer said idly as she kicked the thing in the chest and then tried to bring her batons down on its shoulders. Spy Roach looked at her like the attempt was useless and with a quick hand smacked Jennifer hard in the face.

"Hands off my girl." Raph snapped and kicked the thing in the face. "This wasn't my idea of a date either, where the hell did this thing even come from?" He was about to ask if Jennifer was okay but let it drop as he saw the blonde already standing up, retrieving the one baton she had dropped from the attack. A slight red mark on the left side of her face was the only sign the roach had hit her.

"You never saw it after the first time?" Jennifer asked as she extended the blades from her baton and got ready to attack it, though she wasn't sure what angle to go from or if it would even matter.

"No." Raph responded and then hesitated a moment. "Wait, Mikey says he saw something that looked very much like Spy Roach when we freed all of those captive mutants from that Kraang place almost a year ago."

"Grand, but why attack you after all that time?" Jennifer questioned.

Raph dodged an attack from Spy Roach. "I don't know." He answered.

"Is there any indication that this one might be being controlled by the Kraang?" Jennifer asked him as she tried to stab the mutant roach with one end of her baton but the thing dodged it and tried to attack her but she was able to move under the attack to avoid it.

Raph leapt up and then in front of it, taking a quick look at its forehead to see no device on it. He smacked the roach hard in the face and replied, "Nope no control device here."

"Then what could its problem be?" Jennifer wondered. "Could it remember what its predecessor did and want to get revenge on you too?" She again tried to kick the roach mutant but didn't seem to have the strength to cause it to react.

"Just what I need." Raph mused annoyed. "A roach mutant that can somehow span and always wants me dead." Raph kicked him and he ran into the boxes as he fell back. "We've got to figure out how to get rid of it without a giant crystal lensed laser made for drilling into the Earth's crust."

Jennifer looked around for ideas. She knew she didn't have what it took to take him out and she could see that Raph was having a hard time doing more than matching the roach mutant. As she glanced around she saw a wrecking ball just by a warehouse, she could only assume it was being demolished fairly soon. "Raph, how about we use that?" She asked.

Raph followed her line of sight to the wrecking ball. "Any ideas how to use that thing?" He asked her.

Jennifer shook her head. "Not really, you?" She asked.

"Nope." The red masked turtle responded.

"Well I don't see many other choices." Jennifer replied. "So lure that thing toward the warehouse and I'll figure out how to get that thing to work enough to bowl over a bug or squash it in the warehouse, whichever works."

Raph didn't have any better ideas. "Go ahead and get over there then." He said to her "I'll get the roach boy to follow me and we'll catch up." He already knew he had a better chance of keeping the roach distracted and it seemed to be after him anyway.

Jennifer nodded and ran off; Raph was too busy worrying about Spy Roach to notice anything else. He jumped past the roach and kicked it in the back. He swung at the red masked turtle and he barely dodged it. Then he started to make a roundabout run toward the warehouse and could hear the roach coming after him.

Spy Roach then did something it hadn't done with Jennifer around, it started to throw the goo grenades at him and the red masked turtle had to weave and dodge around them. "Some date." Raph muttered as he picked up a piece of wood and slapped one of the goo grenades back at his opponent. It struck him but seemed to have little effect. "And a thick skinned little bug at that."

The explosions from the goo grenades distracted Jennifer even from inside the wrecking ball and she looked up but could barely see Spy Roach in the air and no signs of Raph, though she assumed the mutant had to be responsible for it and that it was directed at her boyfriend. She had lucked out in finding the activation key under the seat and she was sure someone was going to get in trouble for being that careless tomorrow but if she could get it figured out then that's all that mattered for now.

Raph twisted and dodged more goo grenades and then he leap frogged a bunch of boxes only to deliver a kick to Spy Roach's face. They both fell to the ground though the attacking mutant turtle took the landing better as he landed on his feet and was already off again while the roach mutant landed hard and took a few seconds to recover and continue the pursuit.

Raph very quickly reached the warehouse that the wrecking ball was by and he ducked inside though he didn't move past the entrance just in case Spy Roach didn't follow him in and instead chose to go somewhere else. That would actually have been fine as far as he was concerned unless Spy Roach decided that elsewhere was the wrecking ball where Jennifer was trying to figure out how to work it to stop it.

Spy Roach was at least consistent as he flew right into the warehouse. With that being done Raph ducked into the shadows and behind some boxes he could only assume was junk if they were still in here. He pulled out his T-phone and asked in a whisper, "How you doing out there honey?"

Jennifer had set her T-phone on top of the control panel. She wasn't sure Raph would catch the slight blush in her cheeks at being called honey. She thought though that might be a good thing. "Keys are in and I'm going to turn it on. I think swinging the wrecking ball should be simple enough. Just stay low so I don't accidently hit you with it, okay?" Sher responded.

"No problem." Raph promised. "I'm trying to stick to the shadows."

Spy Roach turned around as if he heard him and shot goo grenades at him and Raph dodged out of the way. He wanted to strike back but it was hard to do that without getting up higher and risking getting hit by a wrecking ball when Jennifer came through, and he refused to believe that she wouldn't.

Raph dodged more goo grenades from Spy Roach and wished he had a few to toss back. He settled with throwing a few shurikens at his opponent though it did little more than annoy him.

Raph was just about to risk moving in closer when a wall went down and the wrecking ball smashed in. Spy Roach expertly dodged it. The red masked turtle glared annoyed at the roach mutant and then picked up one of the boxes and threw it him. The box smashed into Spy Roach and it seemed to stun him for a moment. The red masked turtle swore Spy Roach shook its head as if trying to shake off the effect. That was why it didn't notice as the wrecking ball made a return and smashed into Spy Roach from behind. It then ended up getting smashed in between that and a support beam.

The wrecking ball abruptly stopped and Spy Roach fell to the ground. Raph watched it for a moment until he heard Jennifer's light footsteps enter the slightly decimated warehouse. She stopped by her boyfriend. "Is it dead?" She asked softly.

"I think so." Raph said but before they could move or say anything more Spy Roach started again to move. The red masked turtle quickly withdrew two more shurikens and tossed them at the rope holding the wrecking ball. The large object fell and seemed to smash Spy Roach, the same vicious liquid that was seen from the original Spy Roach was seen being squirted out with this one and Raph quickly moved himself and Jennifer behind a box to avoid the splash.

"I think it's dead now." Raph said and Jennifer nodded with a small giggle and a look that said you think.

They returned to their picnic. They found some seagulls going after the pizza bagels and one attempting to go after the chips though they flew away at their approach. Miraculously the soda and the red velvet cheesecake remained untouched.

They sat down and Jennifer cut some cheesecake for her and Raph and topped both pieces with whipped cream. Raph decided to be nice and dumped the chips on the docks for the birds.

"I know this was never really the ideal date night." Raph said. "Even before Spy Roach the second showed up here."

Jennifer handed Raph his plate. "It wasn't how I pictured my first date, but walking away unhurt given how we live and what I grew up with is a major win in my book." She told him lightly as she then reached for her own plate.

Raph took a bite of cheesecake and then faltered. "You know…I don't know what our chances are of actually being able to have a future. I can't guarantee children when we're both ready for it and even if you decide to spend your life with me…well, you're life will be significantly shorter than mine." He said softly.

"I know." Jennifer answered softly back. "Right now children are the furthest thing from my mind, it's a bridge we can worry about when we come to it." She took a deep breath. "As for you outliving me, well I know in this case it's practically a reality. But even if I were to find a human guy he could still outlive me. We all take that chance." She took his hand gently. "For all we know, for as many things there are that try to kill us, I could actually outlive you."

Raph squeezed back gently. "Could be." He relented. "I just don't want there to be any kind of doubt about what things could really be like for us."

"I appreciate it." Jennifer said. "But we're in uncharted territory as is. For all we know it could work out and we could have a big family." She took another bite of her cheesecake. "You know, even with Leo and Aaliyah, at least if they ever worked out their feelings, that complication could still exist."

"How so?" Raph asked.

"Leo was born a turtle like you and mutated. Aaliyah was human until a few months ago." Jennifer reminded him. "Even though I'd like to think the fact they are both essentially humanoid turtles would make it easy for them doesn't make it so. Or Casey and Karai despite him being human and her at least partially."

Raph nodded a bit. "I guess all of our relationships just have to complicated." He groused softly.

"Not just ours." Jennifer added. "Even two normal people can have problems that complicate pregnancy or even make it impossible to carry to term." She took a deep breath. "All we can do is cross those bridges when we come to them and play with the fate hand deals us."

Raph laughed at that. "Mikey said the same thing about playing the hand that fate deals us a few months ago back at the farmhouse." He said. "Though he said because Splinter has said something similar."

The two finished dessert in comfortable silence. Afterward Jennifer moved over and laid her head on Raph's chest. He wrapped his arms around her waist and the two watched the stars for a couple of hours. When Jennifer let out a small yawn the red masked turtle decided it was time to call it a night. They packed up and returned to the lair.

When they passed the turnstiles they found their friends and family waiting for them. "Did you two have a good time?" Splinter asked them.

Raph nodded as he took Jennifer's hand. "Actually yes we did." The red masked turtle answered. "Except for the interruption from Spy Roach the second."

"Say what?" Mikey asked.

Raph told them about the incident at the docks. "Even that was kind of fun." Jennifer added with a smile. "I got to use a wrecking ball for the first, and probably last time, in my life."

"You have to get your kicks where you can." Renet supported perkily.

"Well I'm glad you handled that better than you did our first encounter with Spy Roach." Leonardo said firmly. He clapped his hand on Raph's shoulder. "I have to say, having Jennifer around has done nothing but positive things for you bro."

Raph nodded a bit. "Yeah, they have, haven't they?" He agreed.

"Nothing will change your fear of roaches." Aaliyah said to him. "But what matters is being able to face them when the time comes, like I did."

"When was that?" April asked the female turtle.

"Twice now actually." Aaliyah answered. "When we fought Snake Eyes. I hate snakes and I'm really scared of poisonous ones."

"I think I'm going to call it a night." Jennifer said as she stifled another yawn. "The day has certainly had its share of excitement, be it good or bad." She leaned up and kissed Raph warmly on the lips and the red masked turtle gently responded, wrapping an arm around her waist to pull her close. After a moment she gently pulled away from him. "Good night, guys. Good night Raph, love you."

Raph waved at her as she walked away and called out, "Love you to sweetie. Sleep tight." He then turned to glare at Mikey who seemed ready to make a joke at this but the orange masked turtle was smart enough to keep it to himself.

"Come on man." Leo said. "We're going to watch the Super Robo Mecha Force marathon before we go to bed too."

With one last glance at the form of his girlfriend Raph followed his brothers, Aaliyah, Renet and April to the couch as Karai and Splinter headed to their own rooms for their own privacy.

Jennifer closed her door and let out a contended sigh. She never thought she could be this happy in her life, between her father's mysterious behaviors and Hector's obsessive and abusive behavior toward her. She was confident though that regardless of what happened with Aaliyah, April and the turtles, especially Raph by her side she could handle anything that came from outside or in.

Next up is Mikey and Renet.


	41. Michelangelo and Renet

Mikey: Only the OC's are owned by Myra, TMNT and anything you see on the show is owned by Nickelodeon and not her (looks to Renet) for now at least, right?

Renet: Mikey.

Raph: (smacks Mikey in the back of the head) Stop being stupid you moron.

"I don't know if a walk in the sewers really counts a date there Mikey." Raph mocked his orange masked younger brother as the four brothers sat around the couch until Renet was done talking to Jennifer, Aaliyah and April in the dojo. Splinter and Karai had gone off earlier to make up some of the father/daughter time they had missed and Casey had to watch his sister that evening.

"Dude, we're not going on a date." Mikey countered. "We're just going to spend some time away from the lair and since I can't really go on a casual date, this will have to do it." In reality because of the fact he knew his brothers would not approve of their plans he chose to keep them to himself. Even he knew it was a sort of a gamble but he decided it was worth the risk.

"Lay off of him Raph." Leo said to the red masked turtle. "Our options are severely limited in this kind of situation as it is. We have to take what we can get."

"Besides it's not like he and Renet are actually dating anyway." Donnie pointed out. He was kind of proud of himself for finally winning over April's heart after almost three years. It was kind of refreshing to poke fun at Leo and Mikey for their lack of relationship status but he of course knew he couldn't do so with Raph as he had started dating Jennifer sooner than he had been dating April.

Mikey laughed. "Yeah, dude. Even if I were dating her it wouldn't be after almost three years." He replied.

Raph laughed now. "Ooh, burn." He said and the two of them high fived each other, much to the annoyance of their purple masked brother.

The girls could of course here the conversation from the bridge and April couldn't help but roll her eyes in defense of her boyfriend. After all it wasn't really Donnie's fault it had taken them that long to get together. On the other hand she had known the turtles long enough to know the fact the delay was more on her part wouldn't enter into their good natured sibling teasing.

"I can't believe Mikey could like that convincingly to them." Jennifer noted. Unlike the elder boys, the girls knew this was more than a walk in the sewers though they weren't entirely sure on the plans either, as one would say ignorance is bliss.

For this occasion the three girls had been able to get through to Renet that she should leave her time mistress outfit behind in favor of something that would make it easier to blend into the world above. After some debate Renet had settled on a blue silk cashmere shirt and a knee length blue skirt, and this was the first time any of them had seen her blonde hair, which was almost as long as Jennifer's own was. She however would not agree to leave the time scepter behind, though given the power it contained and the fact that Savanti Romero was still out there and could decide to come after it, they could all understand why.

"You know, I know they love each other and all, but sometimes I really think they underestimate Mikey." Renet noted as she was brushing out her hair with some help from Jennifer.

"I've said the same thing recently." April noted. "Especially to Raph." She looked to Jennifer. "Too bad that's one thing you haven't been able to mellow him out on."

Jennifer shrugged a bit. "I guess it's something I don't have the expertise on." She replied. "I mean I don't have siblings. None of us do." She looked to Renet and added, "At least as far as we know." Truth was what anyone knew about Renet could be fit snugly into a matchbox, but since she was from the future they all understood the need for her to keep those things a secret from them.

"Nope, I'm in your club." Renet answered simply, which surprised them all a bit. "I'm an only child too." The apprentice time mistress was already certain of one thing; in time she would make sure everyone here who cared for her would know all about her. She hated to lie.

Renet and Aaliyah however did exchange soft looks. Renet was the only one who knew that Aaliyah was not an only child as she the female turtle had confided that to her during their trip to a museum in Greece to try to stop Savanti and his new partner Verminator X. The apprentice time mistress suspected the only reason Aaliyah even told her that was because the female turtle figured she already would have known in the first place so it wasn't a really big reveal.

Jennifer stood back and smiled at Renet. "Well, I think that should do it." She said.

Renet looked in the mirror, suddenly nervous. "Do I look okay?" She asked.

"You look fine." April said as Jennifer had her own, "You look beautiful."

Renet smiled at them both. "It's kind of cold, like you three are my sisters." She admitted as she took Jennifer and April's hand and then smiled at Aaliyah.

Aaliyah laughed. "I think you mean it's kind of cool." She corrected her gently.

"Oh yeah." Renet said sheepishly. "My glad."

"Bad." The three girls corrected her at the same time and Renet laughed. The four girls exited the dojo. The four turtles rose at their approach and all four of them looked kind of shocked to see Renet as she was now.

"Wow." Mikey got out.

Raph seemed to be doing a double take as he looked from his girlfriend to the apprentice time mistress and back to his girlfriend before saying to her, "You two almost look like you could be twins."

"Sure." Jennifer agreed with a giggle. "If Renet wasn't a few centuries older than me."

"Linerally speaking anyway." Donnie added.

"Ready Mikey?" Renet asked with a cute smile.

"Let's do it." Mikey said as he came over and took her hand. The two of them started to the turnstiles, Renet stopping to grab a messenger bag that she was going to keep the time scepter in.

Leo watched them a moment. "Isn't Renet a little…overdressed for a simple walk in the sewers?" He asked suspiciously.

"Hey, you can't blame a girl for wanting to look good." Aaliyah said to Leo in an attempt to divert his suspicions. Then the white masked turtle nodded her head to the dojo. "Come on; show me that kata you say should work well with my bunrei's." Together the two of them headed toward the dojo.

April and Donnie headed toward the lab to work on the mind control serum as Jennifer took Raph's hand. "Come on, let's watch something together."

Not long after Mikey and Renet had made their way past the lair, the apprentice time mistress opened up one of the time doors. This one was of course not supposed to take them in time, they might have been more willing to reveal a date plan that would take them to a future more tolerant if that had been the plan, and it would have been the smart thing to do.

Instead they went through the door way and found themselves on a rooftop across from a new pizza place's grand opening; Cowabunga Carl's Pizzeria and Playtime Arcade. It appealed to Mikey's tastes because they offered gourmet pizzas and they had enough games to keep both of them entertained for a while. The part that worked the most though was that if asked Mikey could pass himself off of as one of the mascot's Cowabunga crew and simply be on their lunch hour.

Mikey helped Renet off of the rooftop and together the two of them made their way into the pizzeria. The host did give them a once over though it was hard to tell if he was startled by someone coming in dressed as part of their crew or if he was impressed by Renet. They were led toward a table, near the games as Mikey requested, and then they were told to flag down one of the servers when they were ready.

"What is that?" Renet asked as she looked around and pointed to the ski ball games.

"You've never played ski ball?" Mikey asked her, sounding astonished. When the apprentice time mistress shook her head he took her hand and gently stood her up. "Let's go change that one right away."

As he was taking her over both of them heard one of the server's whisper, "I can't believe it's him." They ignored the comment as they assumed the man 'recognized' Mikey as what he was trying to act as for the next hour or so. Mikey went over and placed in two quarters (he had been stockpiling these for years in case this day ever happened) and out came four small brown balls.

"Do we use these?" Renet asked him, her eyes kind of wide.

Mikey nodded. "Yep." He confirmed and then took one of the balls. He tossed it up the slide and it bounced up a bit and entered the round 500 point hole just above the middle.

"Can I try?" Renet asked him. The orange masked turtle nodded and stepped back a little to let her do it. She picked it up and tried to mimic Mikey's throw but it went south, slid to the left and went into the 100 point hole.

"You'll have to develop your own style for this." Mikey said, being one of the few who even say there was a sense of style for playing ski ball. "Let's try this again." When Renet picked another of the balls up Mikey moved in and took his right hand in her right wrist, his left hand moving to her waist. The apprentice time mistress didn't object to the touch at all. "See if you can visualize where you want the ball to go, try not to twist your wrist, and slide it gently." Renet did as she was instructed and the ball moved up and into middle hole worth 1000 points.

Renet turned toward him with a smile. "That was so awesome!" She said with the sort of enthusiasm most wouldn't expect from a human of this time period. She had to lean up just a bit on her toes to kiss Mikey on the lips briefly. Before the orange masked turtle could fully figure out how to process this she turned back around with, "Let's play some more."

A couple of hours passed with them playing ski ball. Both of them had been so engrossed in the game that neither of them noticed as most of the customers was either shooed out of the restaurant or shoved into the back toward the bathrooms.

They had gotten a handful of tickets and Mikey leaned down to tear them off. "What do we do with those?" Renet asked Mikey curiously.

"We can turn them in for some cool prizes." Mikey answered. "I think there's enough here that I can get you this cute little pink bunny I saw at the prize counter when we walked in." He took her hand. "Let's get some pizza, I'm starving."

"Yeah I…" Renet started but stopped when she turned to see about a dozen staff members, another six customers, and the place empty. "Mikey?" She asked him sounding a bit worried.

"Uh, did we win a private party or something?" Mikey asked one of the servers, not getting too close. Something was setting his ninja senses on edge, even though he often tried to ignore those things. But his bros weren't around and he had Renet to think about too.

Instead of answering his question the man replied, "I can't believe you found this out so soon Michelangelo." They each took a menacing step forward.

"Do you know these people Mikey?" Renet asked him.

"Nope." Mikey answered. "Who are you people? How do you know me?"

Then they heard, not from the people in the room, but from the back, "I know you because of the fact that you defeated me, you-a ruined my feast."

"Huh?" Renet seemed confused.

"Is it possible?" Mikey wondered. "Was it not a dream?"

"It a-was no dream." The voice said. Out from the back of the kitchen came what literally appeared to be large glop of pizza topping with crust over the top parts of his body. He had pepperoni eyes and a mushroom nose. He had some other toppings on his body. "I'm a-back and this time I'm going to get the feast I wanted."

"Not on my watch, Pizza Face." Mikey replied and Renet had to stop herself from laughing. The name Pizza Face, while appropriate for this mutant, still came across to her as a ridiculous name. "I beat you once and I'll beat you again." He declared.

"Attack." Pizza Face ordered his new minions. Mikey wasn't sure how Pizza Face got these guys to work for him though. They all started toward the orange masked turtle who pulled out his nunchuck's.

"I think you get out of here and call my bros." Mikey said to his date as he twirled them around.

"I am not leaving you." Renet all but snapped at the suggestion. She did reach into her messenger bag to pull out her T-phone but the host leapt out and smacked the phone from her hand which went flying into the ball pit. He then tried to swing at her but she dodged it and pulled out the only other thing she had, her time scepter.

Mikey took down two of the staff, apologizing at the same time. They were possessed and it wasn't their fault they were being made to do this. "How did you even possess these people?" Mikey asked the pizza mutant as he fought. "I don't even see those weird floating pizza minions of yours."

Pizza Face laughed. "I don't think I want to spoil that surprise for you turtle." He gloated.

The host again went after Renet. There was a look on his face that most definitely would have put Jennifer on edge but Renet didn't have the experience to think that way. She did however realize that he was still a threat right now and she swung her time scepter at his arm, making him step back and glare, but the apprentice time mistress followed through with a very impressive leg sweep for someone with no training and he fell to the ground hard. He didn't move but Renet saw he was breathing and he was not bleeding.

Mikey was glad that despite the mind control they weren't exactly threats. He was only down to two of them, though one of them did seem to have a small degree of martial arts training. "Come on Pizza Face, gimmie a spoiler here or something." The orange masked turtle implored.

Renet approached another of the downed staffers, this time a young black woman, and placed her time scepter just above her head before slowly bringing the time scepter down her body until it hit her stomach and the top seemed to glow and project something. "It looks like some sort of pepperoni. Maybe he's using it as link to their minds, ready to take over their thoughts and actions at his convenience." She suggested. In truth it wasn't a guess, she already knew that Pizza Face would implement something like this, but the problem here was he wasn't supposed to try this for years, not until after…

Her thought was interrupted when Pizza Face slammed her in the chest and face with a glop of pizza, and that made her hit the ground hard. "You have a really big mouth little girl." Pizza Face growled almost dangerously. He rushed toward her with far more speed than either of them could have anticipated and he grabbed her up by her face.

"Put her down, now." Mikey demanded as he turned away from the two remaining minions to go help her. The orange masked turtle saw the hand extend some cheese and force something down into Renet's throat, he was sure it had to be that piece of pepperoni she had identified in the others.

With that done he said, "My pleasure turtle." He then dropped her on the ground which seemed to be a pretty rough landing. "In just a few moments when your little girlfriend wakes up she will be my willing servant, just as these others are."

Mikey got hit in the head from behind from the staffer he thought had some kind of training. He wielded a skillet and while the orange masked turtle knew he wasn't bleeding his head was now starting to pound a beat in his head that he didn't need right now. He looked around to realize he had accidently dropped his weapons.

"Last time you ate through my restraints." Pizza Face said with an annoyed tone to his voice. "That won't happen this time." With that he took one of Mikey's nunchuck and extended it to the kusarigama and used that to tightly wrap Mikey up. It never occurred to the orange masked turtle how he had known to do that. "And now I will be making my first calzone, with a nice turtle flavoring."

One of the two remaining minions grabbed the kusarigama chain and dragged Mikey to the kitchen, the other minion and Pizza Face following. "Your girlfriend should be in here in just enough time to see you get baked and eaten." The mutant pizza mocked with laughter as he entered.

Mikey tried his best to struggle out but knew from experience how well his kusarigama could restrain the normal type of person or even mutant. The prospect of eating the metal didn't even seem to bother Pizza Face all that much as he was tossed into a large thing of dough. "Man, all of those pizzas I ate and I never thought this would happen." He mused.

The door opened and Renet walked in with her time scepter. "Ooh, I love calzones." She announced.

"A-maybe I will let you take a bite out of this calzone when it is a-done." Pizza Face said amused.

"Nah," Renet shrugged. "Not how I like my turtle." And with that she powered up her energy knuckles and smacked Pizza Face right in the center of what she assumed would be his body and set him flying hard into the opposite wall. The minions tried to move in on the blonde but Mikey twirled around and used his awesome dance skills to smack both of them in the head with his feet and knock them out.

Renet came over and unwrapped Mikey from his own weapon. "Are you okay?" She asked him, concern lacing her face and voice.

"It's all good Renet." Mikey promised. "But how did you not get possessed?"

"I'm an apprentice time mistress." Renet answered simply. "I go all over the place knowing that as a whole I have to keep that secret. We have to make sure we take something or have something that is resistant to things like mind control or truth serum stuff."

Mikey laughed. "That is so cool…you're so cool." He leaned down as if to kiss Renet on the lips and the girl looked like she was more than willing, even starting to lean up to meet Mikey halfway when pizza goo slapped both of them hard on the side and they recovered quickly enough to see that, as Raph would have told them, they were celebrating too soon.

"I won't let one little girl ruin my revenge against this turtle." Pizza Face vowed. "And I won't two of you ruin my plans."

"That's what you think Pizza Face." Mikey said as he stood up. Renet handed him his other nunchuck. He in turn looked to his date. "Shall we?"

Renet nodded. "Let's shall." She agreed. Together the two of them ran toward Pizza Face and each of them smacked him hard with their chosen weapon (not that the time scepter was made to be a weapon but Renet was quickly proving Splinter's point that anything can be a weapon) and then they both kicked him. Pizza Face went flying right into the oven and somehow the doors closed, trapping the mutant pizza in the oven. He kind of let out a shrill scream for several seconds before all was silent and it started to get smoky.

Mikey and Renet returned to the dining room (not noticing the small glop of pizza with one pepperoni eye and mushroom nose slink out the door) and helped the staffers recover, the only place where Mikey wasn't looked at strangely since they believed in him to be in costume though he did receive some comments about how realistic it seemed to the touch. The young staffer Renet had examined went to the back to let out the customers that had been shepherded there.

"Should we get something to eat now?" Renet asked him.

"It may sound weird but I don't think I want pizza tonight." Mikey replied. As Renet recovered the messenger bag Mikey went over and set the tickets on the counter, claiming the pink bunny and handing it to Renet, who cooed happily and hugged it to her chest.

The two of them made their way onto the roof then. "Shall we go to the lair then?" Renet asked him.

Mikey shook his head. "Nope." He took her hands gently in his own. 'I am so glad that I didn't have to fight you back there." He confessed.

"You could have subdued me without truly hurting me." Renet pointed out.

"True." The orange masked turtle agreed. "But I wouldn't have wanted to do that."

Renet laid her head on his chest. "I'm glad you didn't have to do that either." She admitted. "That actually would have hurt you more than words could have."

The two of them laid down against an air conditioning vent, with Renet staying with her position against Mikey. He giggled a little at the feeling of her soft blonde hair against his arm. "I wonder if that is what Raph feels with Jennifer." He wondered to himself.

The sat like that for a few minutes before she pulled back to look at Mikey. "I think we were in the middle of something before Pizza Face tried to attack us." She realized.

Mikey looked confused for just a moment before practically having a light bulb moment. "Oh, yeah." He said and then both of them leaned into each other and their lips met, brushing together softly before meeting again in a more passionate kiss. Mikey's arms encircled her waist as she pressed her body against his and the orange masked turtle was vaguely surprised at how comfortable this position felt. Anyone who could see them on that roof would have seen the two sharing their first kiss practically surrounded by that of the full moon. That lasted for a minute or so but to them it was like time was meaningless until they final separated, out of breath.

"That was nice." Renet said. "My first kiss."

"Yeah, mine too." Mikey admitted, perhaps a little embarrassed at the revelation.

Renet leaned in again and brushed his lips with her own. "Come on though, let's at least find something to eat." She said.

Mikey's stomach rumbled as if agreement. The two of them found a burger place and Renet picked up some food before the two of them found a nice secluded bench in Central Park to eat at. None of them said much about the less than fancy cuisine because honestly it didn't bother either of them.

"You know, I'm kind of glad that Pizza Face showed up again though." Mikey said to Renet. "Someone else finally really knows he exists. My brothers and even April thought I was just dreaming it."

"Are we going to tell them about this?" Renet asked. They hadn't told anyone what they were really doing tonight after all.

Mikey thought a moment and shook his head. "Nah, I think we're better off keeping this a secret as long as we can." He decided. Renet couldn't disagree with that in the long run but one thing still bothered her; Pizza Face shouldn't have made those hypno pepperoni things for a while yet.

After eating the two of them stayed at the park bench for a little while longer, Renet had her legs curled up under her and her head lay comfortably on Mikey's chest as he kept his arm around her. As they sat there the wind picked up just a bit causing the apprentice time mistress to shiver a bit and the orange masked turtle decide it was time to go home.

They returned to the lair to find at that point all three turtle brothers and the three girls had gathered around the couch and Jennifer was ready to put in Vampire Academy. The two of them joined their families. Jennifer smiled a bit as she saw that Renet and Mikey seemed to have found out there feelings for one another. She made a mental note to ask Renet how their date went after the movie, or the next morning if they all fell asleep.

Leo leaned over and asked his youngest brother, "Did you two have a good time on your walk through the sewers?" He still didn't believe that was what they had really done, though he figured as long as the news didn't report sightings of a giant talking turtle the next morning it probably didn't matter.

Mikey looked to his brother, and Leo knew something had changed. He was sure Renet had something to do with it. "We had a really great time." He answered with a wide smile and a giggle from Renet.

Anyone get the Cowabunga Carl reference? We'll be having another more long term reference to that movie later on. Next up though is Donatello and April.


	42. Donatello and April

Donnie: Myra owns nothing here aside from whatever OC's show up.

Donnie loaded another piece of equipment on the Shellraiser and as he came out he saw his brothers at the doorway, along with Master Splinter. "Are you going somewhere Donatello?" Splinter asked him smartest son.

The purple masked turtle nodded. "Yeah, there's a little grotto a few miles from here that goes seems to originate from the ocean. April determined a Kraang base had been established there and that they've had some subtle mutagen run out that might be affecting the ocean life. We're going to test the waters and whatever kind of life we find there to see if that's true and if so how bad it is." He answered their father.

"You sure know how to show a girl a good time." Raph remarked sarcastically. "At least when Mikey took Renet through the sewers it wasn't for business." The orange masked turtle kind of glanced around guiltily since that is not what happened on their date but both he and Renet had agreed not to speak of it.

"You impress your girlfriend your way; I'll impress her my way." Donatello commented back to Raph a little irritably. In truth that was only half the reason they were making the trip. The other was because they were going to have their own picnic together but Donnie wanted to do it during the day even if it had to be underground. He had already stored the picnic basket in the Shellraiser.

"Just be careful Donnie." Leo said to his brother. "I know it may seem like coincidence that Casey and Karai got attacked by the Purple Dragons while we were dealing with Creep Weed and Jennifer and Raph got attacked by Spy Roach…"

"The second." Mikey added, going with the addition his red masked brother had given it.

The blue masked turtle rolled his eyes. "The second." He added. "But if it's not you can't rule out that you and April could be attacked as well."

"Considering who we are, you probably will get attacked by something." Raph said. "If you're lucky though it'll be nothing more dangerous than rabid lichen."

"I think we can manage if something happens." Donnie replied. "I've got the Shellraiser with us after all, which is more than Raph and especially Casey had." The purple masked turtle shrugged. "And don't forget that Mikey and Renet didn't end up with any problems." That caused another slightly guilty glance from the orange masked turtle.

In the kitchen Karai, Jennifer, Renet and Aaliyah sat at the table as April was getting a few snack items for the trip since she didn't know Donnie had planned the excursion as a dual picnic too. Renet managed not to look quite as guilty as Mikey did though.

Karai had even made the same comment Raph had. "Sure seems like Donnie knows how to show you a good time O'Neil." She had said half-jokingly and half mockingly. The truth was that Karai and April had almost started to develop a 'sisterly' bond akin to Leo and Raph, which the other three girls were not entirely convinced was a good thing.

April shrugged. "Some of us don't feel the need to have our lives put in danger for a good time." She replied back to Karai's jab.

"Just be careful." Jennifer said to her red headed friend. "I know it might seem like a coincidence that Raph and I got attacked by Spy Roach but…well, I've never believed in coincidences and it seems a lot less likely now more than before I came to New York."

Renet had to nod her head in agreement. She was the only one in the kitchen who knew about the Pizza Face thing and she was the only one in the lair itself to know he had employed a trick that he should not have had yet. She had chosen to keep her hair loose after her date with Mikey and had stuck to wearing regular clothes since then, except for the cape. She liked having it and she knew Mikey liked it too. "Yeah, just be on the lookout." She advised and each of the four girls had to take a moment to think about her words as they never knew when she was saying something because she could or if she were relaying a cryptic warning.

"We'll be careful Renet." April promised the apprentice time mistress as she picked up the plastic bag. She gently patted Jennifer's hand before leaving the kitchen to go to her boyfriend. She saw Splinter and the other three turtle brothers leaving the garage, each of them giving her their equivalent of 'have a good time'.

"Ready Donnie?" April asked as she came into the lab.

"Ready." Donnie said as he took April's hand and noticed the bag. "What's that?" He asked.

"Just a few bottled waters and some peanut butter crackers in case we get hungry while we're out there." The red head answered as they got in the Shellraiser. She put it under the seat Donnie would normally occupy. She would be taking that position for this outing while Donnie drove. They didn't expect to need the other stations for this.

"Heh, heh. Good thinking." Donnie said nervously aware that April was sitting only inches from the half covered picnic basket that was the other reason for this outing.

Donnie took the Shellraiser out and started toward their destination. April was happy to report that there didn't seem to be any obstacles. "You know, I'm glad you came with me." Donnie said to her. "I know this isn't probably the best way to show you or any girl a good time."

"It's fine Donnie." April said with a sweet smile. "We all make our own fun. I'd rather do this then get ambushed by the Purple Dragons or Spy Roach any day."

"You know I had such grand ideas when I first met you, even if I didn't know if we'd ever actually date." Donnie revealed to her. "But as I thought about it, reality did sink in. Not enough to diminish my hopes we would be together but enough for me to realize that what I can for you is severely limited. We'll never go on a real date like Casey and Karai can. We'll probably never have an official ceremony if we decide to get married. And as for children…"

April cut Donnie off gently but pointedly. "Look, there are plenty of people these days that never have an official wedding ceremony, especially if they're same sex couples. As I already said a date night is what we make it, and as for children…I can't even take care of flowers without worrying about them dying, children haven't even entered my mind right now." She answered and the two of them exchanged gentle chuckles at that last remark.

After a moment April said, "I already expected some of this going in. When Jennifer started thinking about Raph that way I was the only one she could talk to about it. We both had discussions about what we could and couldn't expect with our relationships…well, hers but I found myself applying that to us as well."

"And the pros really outweighed the cons?" Donnie questioned a little dubiously.

"Yes." April answered simply. "Donnie, I don't want you guys out of my lives ever." She still kicked herself whenever she thought about the way she had treated them after her father's accidental mutation, even if to an extent it could be understood. "There's no guarantee that someone else I would meet would be as cool with you guys as Casey was…and there's no guarantee we'd ever find anyone who cares about us the way Raph does for Jennifer or you do for me."

"Raph would always remind me that you're a human and I'm a mutant and he didn't think it would ever work out." Donnie replied as he took a left in the tunnel. "Granted I think he meant it in general since the same thing theoretically applied to all of us but I was the first to fall for girl."

"I think Jennifer changed his tune on that pretty quickly." April noted with some amusement. "Like how Mikey was teasing you guys about liking a girl and saying he wouldn't right before Renet showed up."

Donnie laughed. "Yeah. I keep thinking I should poke fun at him for it but a good chance hasn't come up yet, and I don't want to do that in front of Renet." He confided.

"That's nice of you." April said with a giggle.

Donnie made a final turn and parked the Shellraiser. "It's only a five minute walk from here." He told her. "And the tunnel is too narrow anyway."

April rose and looked at the equipment. "Do we need to bring all of this?" She asked him.

Donnie shook his head as he rose from the driver's seat as he came and placed his arms around the red headed girl's waist. "Nah, most of it is just in case." He answered her. "I only need two things." He reached out and grabbed a small chemistry box. "You take that one and I'll get the other one." It was really the picnic lunch Donnie had planned. He figured the water bottles and crackers would go okay with what he brought.

April took the chemistry box, turned around and kissed Donnie on the cheek and started out of the Shellraiser. The purple masked turtle felt the blush in his cheeks as he reached over for the concealed picnic basket. He then followed April out and then led the way down the tunnel.

As Donnie promised it was a really short walk and it was preceded by a faint glowing, almost like candlelight. "What do you think that's from?" April asked her boyfriend curiously.

"If I had to guess I think it's probably from some slightly mutated lichen. Probably not enough to make it an intelligent mutant like we've seen in the past but enough that it's altered its properties enough to cast that kind of glow." Donnie speculated.

Only moments later they found the small pond area that clearly had a small enclave at the very end that led to the ocean. Just as the purple masked turtle had speculated it was surrounded by lichen that glowed slightly. "So beautiful." April murmured.

"The second most beautiful thing in this room." Donnie said with smile that widened even more at April's cheeks starting to turn crimson in a blush. "Can you collect some of the water and lichen samples while I set up this other thing?"

As the young red head was going about collecting the samples Donnie quickly took out a blanket and spread it out, then he took out the tuna and chicken sandwiches he had made along with Caesar salad then took out the water April bought herself. He had finished just as April turned around and saw it all. Her mouth dropped open slightly.

"Surprise." Donnie announced. "I packed us a lunch, this is the real outing, the rest was just kind of a coincidence."

"Wow, Donnie." April breathed. "This…this is amazing." She had the presence of mind to quickly shelve the samples in case it was actually needed at any point before she came over to the blanket and sat down. The purple masked turtle opened one of the waters and handed it to April before opening up his own.

"Chicken and tuna sandwich, salad and the crackers." Donnie said as he took out the crackers April had also bought. "Human food that isn't pizza."

"We could have had that." April replied.

Donnie shrugged. "Nah, I know we do a lot of that already so I figured something different for our lunch date would be better." He said.

As April unwrapped the sandwiches Donnie took out two plastic forks and two bowls and scooped up salad for each of them. "Do the other guys know about this place?" April asked.

Donnie shook his head. "Nope." He replied simply.

"Are you going to tell them about it?" April asked Donnie now. She was sure if she liked the place then Jennifer and Renet would probably like this place too. Even Aaliyah would too although so far her friend and their blue masked friend hadn't admitted their feelings for each other just yet.

Donnie bit his lip. "I don't know." He finally confessed as he handed April her salad. "I mean I would hate the idea of exposing the one place we could have to ourselves for a while." He took a small drink of his water. "I suppose maybe in time I will."

April smiled at him. She could understand both points. It was true that they all had very little options and to give them another place to go would help them out in their complicated dating lives. On the other hand, they all shared so much it would be nice if they could have something all to themselves.

A few minutes passed in companionable silence and then April thought she heard…sensed…something. "Donnie, are you sure your brothers don't know about this place? Or Master Splinter?" She asked.

"Positive." Donnie said simply. In truth he supposed he didn't know that Splinter didn't know about the place but didn't think he would show up here.

"Don't you hear that?" She asked him.

Donnie was about to deny it when he thought he did hear something approaching. He stood up and withdrew his bo staff, and April followed suit with her tessen's. Aside from the near ambient light that came from the lichen it was pretty much dark and for a moment all they saw was a moving shadow though he swore there was some kind of red on it.

"I don't think anyone's here." Donnie whispered.

"I can feel something and they can probably see us a little better than we can see them." April whispered back.

"But all I see is like one vaguely shadowy…" Donnie started and then he figured it out. He pulled April out of the way just as several laser blasts were shot out right toward the red head.

"Who is that?" April asked.

"Pretty sure I know who it is." Donnie said. "That has to be the Newtralizer."

From the shadows emerged the alien salamander with his weapon drawn. "Stay out of my way turtle." He warned.

"What the hell does he want?" April wondered.

"You." Donnie speculated. "He was aiming at you." He turned to Newtralizer as he approached them with his weapon drawn and ready to fight again. "When you attacked the Kraang base that they were at to get the mutagen, you stole information from them. Some of that must have been about April."

"The Kraang want the girl." Newtralizer allowed. "If that means I have to eliminate her to stop whatever plans the Kraang have then that is what I shall do."

Donatello swirled his bo staff around in both of his hands. "If you want her you're going to have to go through me." He warned the alien salamander.

"Rakarakaraka." Newtralizer laughed and then added, "That's fine with me." With that he shot again at two of them and they had to roll to the side. When they looked it appeared he was gone but they both knew the truth.

"We need to get the Shellraiser's headlights on to give us some more visibility." Donnie whispered to April. It turned out the romantic ambient of course wasn't too conductive to a fighting situation. "Get to the Shellraiser and turn it on."

"You go." April retorted softly to Donnie. "If I go he'll try to track me to it anyway. If you go he may be more inclined to ignore you and focus on me." When Donnie hesitated the red head was sure he was about to express safety for her and she added, "I can take care of myself for at least a few minutes. Go." The purple masked turtle hesitated one more second and then nodded as he disappeared into the shadows.

April had her tessen's out and cautiously looked around the area. She thought she had a pretty good advantage now that he wasn't walking around with them unaware and she could see the lights of the laser and block or dodge accordingly.

That was tested moments later when he shot his lasers at her. She dodged three of the blasts and used a tessen to try to reflect it back at him but it was clear he had already dodged out of the reflect shot. She steeled herself again for the next laser assault.

She was paying attention for any signs of the laser lights that she wasn't ready when Newtralizer jumped out of the shadows and slammed right into her. She fell back hard and he tried to stab her with a wicked plasma looking knife but she brought up her Tessen's and trapped the blade in between her fan weapons. "Get off of me." April groaned out through his bigger size boring down on her.

"Not a chance." Newtralizer stated and then gave a bizarre looking smile. "Time to die girl."

Blinding headlights flared on and both of them were temporarily blinded, and that gave Donnie the time he need to fire the garbage cannon straight at Newtralizer. It slammed him off of April and a few feet down the passageway. The purple masked turtle came to the red head's side. "Are you okay April?" He asked her.

She nodded. "I'll be okay. Now we just have to figure out how to get rid of this guy so we can go back to our date." She answered.

"At least the sandwiches won't get cold." Donnie noted with some amusement.

Newtralizer rose and gave off a roar, reminding April of either a lower pitched roar of the T-rex in the Jurassic Park series or similar to that of the Xenomorph sound from the Alien's series. He then charged right at them with his plasma blade. The red head blocked it and then brought up an uppercut to his jaw. Donnie followed through with a bo staff to the stomach that again sent him sprawling.

"You're not going to win this one Newtralizer." Donnie told him.

"Watch me." Newtralizer replied and fired the lasers at them again so that he could separate the purple masked turtle and the red head from each other. With that done he again attacked April, trying to bring the plasma dagger down on her head but she dodged to the side though he managed to skim her left arm.

"April!" Donnie exclaimed and jumped up in the air, twirling his staff again. He brought it down on the back of Newtralizer's head. He turned around only to get clocked in the stomach, then the purple masked turtle reversed the staff and tripped him. As Newtralizer fell to the ground he extended the blade to make his naginata and placed the pointed end at his throat. "This is done Newtralizer." Donnie stated.

The alien salamander glared up at his purple masked adversary. "This won't be over until I get rid of the Kraang's special little project." He replied.

"Special project?" April questioned. "They don't even need me anymore, as the invasion of New York a few months back proved. They wanted me to perfect the mutagen but they figured it out." She explained.

"You think that's your only use?" Newtralizer questioned with a laugh. "They still have a use for you, as should have been obvious from your sister."

"I don't have a sister." April stated.

"I think he means May." Donnie filled in.

"Ah, right. Got it." April said.

"Anything they want April for they'll go after May for too and she's more of a help to their plans that she would be." Donnie said to Newtralizer. In reality Donnie suspected he would never catch the doppelganger as she was more powerful than the red head was, at least without Jennifer.

Newtralizer hissed up at them. "Any chance the Kraang have I want eliminated." He stated and with that he swept his tail around and tripped up Donnie. He turned to where April had been but she had moved into the Shellraiser and had extended the manhole cover launcher which she immediately fired at him.

He managed to dodge a few of them but as the barrage continued he growled at them. "This isn't over." He stated and then fled the area, manhole covers still on his heels. After a few moments she stopped.

"Nice shot April." Donnie said as he stood up.

"Thanks." April said. The purple masked turtle came over to her and sat her down so he could take a look at her wound. Luckily the cut had been superficial and the most long lasting damage had been done to her shirt sleeve.

"The cut itself has already started to heal." Donnie told her as he never the less used an alcohol dabbed cotton ball to clean the wound anyway. It stung a little but April endured it without a problem. After that was taken care of he asked, "Shall we get back to lunch?"

"Sounds good." April said and Donnie held his arm. She took her arm in his and he escorted her back to their picnic. They sat down to enjoy their meal, though the area was a bit more of a mess after the fight against Newtralizer. Donnie pulled out the last thing he hadn't earlier; two wrapped pieces of chocolate cake.

As they got ready to finish their last bites April stopped him. "You know, we might never get a real wedding, so there is one thing I really want to try." She said.

"What's that?" Donnie asked her curiously.

"I saw a picture of my mom and dad at their wedding, and they were feeding each other cake." April said. "Let's try that one."

Donnie nodded. "Sure." They each took the last piece of their cake and fed each other the last piece, though Donnie's grazed her mouth and left frosting on her lips. He laughed and said, "Look frosting lips." Then he leaned down and licked the frosting off of her lip before giving her a very warm and passionate kiss. April returned it and wrapped her arms around his neck. After a few moments they pulled away breathless.

After putting the utensils away they settled down on the picnic blanket, Donnie wrapped his arm around her and she laid her head on his chest. They stayed that way for a while as he stroked her hair. Finally April asked, "So do we tell the others about Newtralizer even though it means exposing this place?"

"We have to." Donnie answered simply. "The fact is that Newtralizer escaped and could still come after you. They all need to be aware of the threat he might continue to pose."

"So much for keeping this place a secret." April replied.

"I know." Donnie sighed. "We're going to have to work out a schedule or something."

April giggled softly to herself. "I'm sorry this date got ruined." Donnie told her. "I guess Leo was right to tell us to be cautious.

"Renet said the same thing." The red head admitted. "Though of course we don't know if she really knew this was going to happen or not. It's one of the downsides of knowing someone who can travel through time. You don't know always know how much you should heed what she says."

"Yeah. Leo's Space Heroes show would file that under the Temporal Directive, not revealing anything about the future to those who live in the past, at least not more than they have too." Donnie reflected. He privately wondered why Lord Simultaneous allowed Renet to even hang out with them, official business or no, unless he knew something even Renet didn't know.

After a few more minutes they decided they should get back to the lair. They packed up what was left of the picnic and Donnie helped April up and walked her to the Shellraiser. Once they got inside Donnie had April sit next to him for another surprise he thought of. He was going to show her the basics of driving as she began to train for her learning permit.

Half an hour later they returned to the lair. Renet looked relieved on that and April assumed the apprentice time mistress must have known that there was a good chance that Newtralizer would show up. She felt a momentary flash of annoyance that she didn't say anything before realizing in a roundabout way she had, and perhaps in the only way she could have.

"Have fun collecting samples?" Raph asked with a smirk that he quickly tamped down when Jennifer shot him a look that said to behave himself, perhaps the only person in the world who could do that to the red masked turtle.

"You were right Leo." Donnie sighed. "Our date was interrupted for a bit by Newtralizer."

"Why?" Karai asked.

"According to what Donnie got Newtralizer to admit to he found information on me from the Kraang database at the same time that you girls attacked for the mutagen to make retro mutagen." April explained to them all. "He decided he needed to kill me to screw over the Kraang."

"Good luck to him." Mikey said. "We're not going to let that happen." Even Karai could agree with that statement.

"It was still nice." April said as she came over and hugged Donnie, then planted a kiss on his lips for a moment. "Any day I can to spend time with the man I love is all that matters."

Almost as if rehearsed Jennifer and Renet seconded that opinion.

"Well at least now we know everyone is accounted for." Leo said seriously.

"Why? What happened?" Donnie asked.

"This." Leo answered and pointed to the news where they were announcing that the Purple Dragons had been thwarted in a store robbery. The one who stopped it was a person dressed completely in a metallic suit. They couldn't find any distinctive features to go with the suit or even a name to go with them. "Someone is out there doing our work."

"Isn't that a good thing?" April asked.

"if it were just the Dragons, sure." Leo relented. "But the problem is will this new vigilante stick to the Dragons?"

No one had an answer to that, or in Renet's case if she knew she wasn't really able to answer that one.

The last up is Leo and Aaliyah, who will also lead us into the next arc.


	43. Leonardo and Aaliyah

Leo: TMNT is owned by Nickelodeon. Only the OC's are not owned by them.

April and Casey had gone home for the night. Splinter was either asleep or meditating in his room. Karai was likewise either asleep or meditating. Jennifer and the three younger brothers were asleep in their own bedroom. Leo was getting ready to go out that night on his own as he sometimes did when he thought something more needed to be done than the standard patrol.

Tonight was one of those nights. After the report of the mystery armored vigilante he wanted to be out there and try to make sure whoever it was wasn't getting into something more than that person could handle. And if he were honest with himself he had one other reason to get out, he had energy to spare right now.

He hated to admit it but he found himself just a little bit jealous of his little brothers. Raph was dating Jennifer for about a month now. Donnie had finally gotten his crush on April returned to him and even Mikey had been playing hands on with Renet for weeks before something had changed.

Ever since Karai had been freed the two of them had privately talked very little but in the small time they had Leo had revealed that whatever feelings he had about her weren't really romantic, the final proof of that having been when he had held his oldest sister as the infant Miwa when they had been sent back in time after first dealing with Savanti Romero. Karai hadn't seemed too surprised or upset by this, though he wasn't quite sure when she had made her own discovery on her feelings. Not that it mattered as she had started dating their friend Casey Jones.

Leo quietly got his katana blades and prepared to leave when he heard a voice from the darkness, "Going somewhere?"

He turned ready to attack just in case, but only found Aaliyah. "I thought I'd go out on a little patrol of my own." Leo told the white masked female turtle. "I'm not feeling tired right now."

"Mind if I go with you?" Aaliyah asked him. "I could use some fresh air."

Leo nodded and waited for Aaliyah to get her bunrei's. "Something on your mind?" He asked her.

"No." Aaliyah responded, then after a moment took a breath. "Yes…maybe. I don't know exactly."

The two turtles left the lair and then the sewers and headed toward the roof to do their patrol. Both of them had to ignore the idea that in a way this wasn't a sort of date either of them would have planned…right before they had to remind themselves this wasn't even a date. They weren't even sure how one felt about the other.

"You know, we've known you for about two months now and aside from the fact that you're pretty much as skilled as I am, we don't know much about you." Leo voiced. "Mind if I ask you some questions?"

"Is this an interrogation?" Aaliyah teased him.

Leo wasn't quite sure how to answer that one. In truth one could easily say it was though in a way he just wanted to get to know more about her. He also hoped it would help her to get whatever she had on her mind out in the open. Flirting however was not his forte at all. "Not exactly, but I'm kind of curious."

"It's only fair." Aaliyah relented. She did know about his father and four siblings. In fact she knew of their existence which was more than ninety nine percent of the population was aware of. "I have a mother, father and older sister."

Leo thought a moment. "What was it like, to have a mother?" He asked her.

"I wish I knew how to explain that." Aaliyah answered as they jumped rooftops. "I mean it was normal to me, someone to talk to about things I wouldn't feel comfortable talking to my dad about like my first crush."

"What about your sister?" Leo asked. He wasn't always very open with his brothers but then again he was also the leader. Not to say that sometimes he hadn't talked to them normally either.

"That's complicated." Aaliyah replied. "In many ways my relationship with her is like yours with Raph. Actually maybe more complicated."

"In what way?" Leo asked curiously.

Aaliyah was silent for a moment and they stopped on another rooftop. At first the blue masked turtle wasn't even sure she was going to answer him. Then she came out, "My martial arts talents was something that came out at an early age. For all intents and purposes my parents were pretty practical and they could see how easy it would be for me to make a life out of it." She leaned against the water tower leg. "My sister is a great artist, the last I'd known her. But for every successful artist is like four that aren't. So of course my practical parents didn't see much value in it."

Leo listened quietly, trying not to judge. He couldn't help but see her parent's points and could even kind of agree with them. Still that wasn't how Master Splinter had raised the four of them. He had taught them to follow their dreams as much as was possible. Obviously Mikey would probably never be a famous comic book artist and Donnie wouldn't be able to be the next Bill Gates or anything, but if there had been a way to make it happen he would have been encouraging and not stood in the way.

"So my parents spend so much time encouraging me, supporting me. Taking me to classes and tournaments. Making sure I could get whatever little help I needed. They were at every tournament and every ceremony." Aaliyah continued on. "My sister…she went at first but as things got worse and she realized that my parents weren't making the time for her art shows, of which there were many and she was very good at it, and they weren't supporting what she wanted…those negative feelings transferred from my parents to me."

Leo nodded in understanding. Sometimes he figured the isolation they had all felt in their lives, though not as heavy as it was even a few years ago, was something Raph had directed toward Mikey who didn't show the same feelings or to himself as the one who tried to make sure they could be as normal as they could. "Raph's pretty good at that too." He noted.

"I've noticed." Aaliyah replied. "How similar in a way the two of them are with that." She sighed. "I hated it. I hated the idea that we were drifting further apart because of the differences in our parent's views of us." She looked up at the stars. "I can think of times I argued with my parents to change something so I could go to her art shows and they wouldn't do it for whatever reason. It's one of the things that caused us to drift like that."

"When was the last time you spoke to her?" Leo asked her gently.

"Just before coming here actually." Aaliyah answered softly. "I invited her to come with me. I mean there are some great art museums here in New York and I wanted her to see them. To share them with her. I also wanted her to come to my tournament and to see how well I've done; I wanted her to be proud of me."

"She didn't come though." Leo surmised.

Aaliyah shook her head. "She wanted to. We even made some plans. Even my parents were supposed to get in on it. Our first full family time together in years." Leo saw tears glistening in her eyes and he wrapped an arm around her shoulders. She leaned her head against his shoulder. "Then mom got sick, struck with pneumonia and dad of course had to stay to take care of her. I wanted to stay but they convinced me to go, it was a big tournament." She laughed softly but with a trace of bitterness. "How could they know I'd never make it there because Fulcanelli would mutate me and force me to serve him?"

"What about your sister?" Leo asked.

"She told me she'd come with. That we could still make it work." Aaliyah answered. "Then, about six hours before we were to leave she sent me a text and told me that she wasn't going, that she was tired of trying and that she wanted nothing to do with me anymore."

"That's horrible." Leo said softly.

"So I left for the tournament and you know what happened from there." Aaliyah sighed softly and in a soft voice added, "I don't understand what happened. For the first time in years we were actually working to repair our relationship. We were both so excited. She said she was looking forward to seeing me perform after all this time."

"Could someone have made her send that text?" Leo asked. "Or get a hold of her phone to send it in her place?"

Aaliyah sighed. "Maybe." She agreed. "I wish I knew for sure. For so many years we were distant from each other and I don't know much about her life. I knew about some guy she was seeing, a friend. I don't think it was what she really wanted but…she seemed so desperate to feel needed that he offered affection and even acceptance and she took it, at least for a while."

"So it could have been him then." Leo speculated.

"I wish I knew." Aaliyah said. "I…haven't told anyone about my family, especially my sister except for Renet and only because she probably knows more about this than I do."

Leo laughed a little. "Who would have guessed Mikey of all people would fall for a time traveler." He mused.

"I think about some of what Renet has said, and I think if she thought it was something I really had to be worried about she would drop some kind of hint about it." Aaliyah admitted. "Though with that revelation it makes it seem as if my sister and I will never reconcile. And that was before becoming a mutant turtle…now I have to think about all of you guys too, and as much as I love my family I can't expose your existence to them just to make me happy."

Leo hesitated a moment and then asked a question he'd been dreading, "What about using the retro mutagen to become human again?"

Aaliyah thought about it a moment. "I…I wouldn't mind doing that if we all lived here. But if become human again I have to leave Jennifer, Renet...you…I mean all of you." She confessed. "And I don't want that either."

Leo sighed a bit, a little happy to hear that. Then he said seriously. "The risk involving your family knowing about us. I think that's our decision to make together, not just yours." He knew it was a long shot, he wasn't sure Splinter would concede to letting more people in on their existence and knew how Raph would feel about it regardless, even if Jennifer got him to let the brunt of those feelings go.

Aaliyah looked at him. "You guys would even consider such a thing just for me?" She asked.

"You're our friend." Leo said simply as if that should answer everything. And to an extent it should have. "In fact, you're like family."

Aaliyah felt herself blush at the statement though she wasn't quite sure why it should cause that reaction. Then she leaned over and wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him on the lips. The blue masked turtle was caught off guard and even as he moved his hands to try to draw her back he found his lips responding to hers and when his hands did come in contact with her body he took her shoulders and pressed her against him gently.

After another moment Aaliyah pulled back. "I'm sorry." She said breathlessly. "That was so impulsive and I shouldn't have…"

Leo interrupted her. "No, I should have known better than to…" He started and then stopped himself. "What are we saying?" He wondered.

Aaliyah hesitated a moment. "Good question." She conceded. "I've felt something for you ever since…well since we met, back when Fulcanelli was making Candy and I work for him. And it's only grown."

"I've felt an attraction to you for weeks now too." Leo admitted. "You…are a big part of the reason that I've been able to sort through my feelings concerning Karai. So what are we so afraid of?"

"Life." Aaliyah guessed simply. "Losing each other so easily considering how many things out there seem to want us dead. My family being so…fractured that I'm kind of afraid of losing anything that I might want."

Leo nodded in understanding. "Each of us have been worried as we grew up that nothing would change, Raph has pointed out that no human girl could think of us in this way." He said. "That especially applied to him but I think we've all had that thought except maybe Mikey."

"I'm…" Aaliyah stopped and then corrected herself. "I was human. Enough to know the difference. And you said yourself I could be again." She took Leo's hand in hers. "Even if I were to take the retro mutagen that wouldn't change my feelings for you. Just as Jennifer, April, and Renet are with your brothers knowing they're mutants."

Leo was about to say something else when there was a loud popping sound that made them jump. Aaliyah wasn't sure what it was right off hand but Leo was. "That was a gunshot." He told her. The two of them got up to follow the sound.

They found an alleyway where two men were talking to another man they had clearly shot. Leo was about to interfere when suddenly Aaliyah heard them say something familiar and stopped him. "What?" Leo questioned.

"They're asking about my sister." Aaliyah whispered back. "For some reason they're asking about Adelita."

Leo thought that was a pretty name, much like hers was.

"Adelita would come here." One of them said seemingly very patiently to the man they had shot. He was bleeding from his arm, so at least Leo could see it wasn't a vital one just yet. It was the only reason he was waiting this long. "The last thing heard was her little brat sister Aaliyah was here somewhere. Where is she?"

"How would I know?" He asked them.

"You're a compulsive gambler." The other man said. "You had money on Aaliyah's victory in the tournament. Then she disappeared." He laughed. "Did the girl mess up and you got rid of her? It wouldn't be the first time." That rose both of their alarms a bit though of course that meant the man wasn't an innocent either.

"Look, the girl never came to the tournament." The man told them. "Yeah, I lost the money I had on the girl but even if I decided to get some payback on her she was never around for it."

"I don't really think highly of any of these guys right now." Leo mused.

"Why do you care anyway?" The wounded man asked the two of them.

"She's the last one that the boss wants to make sure is out of the way before he finds Adelita and takes his revenge on her." The man said.

"Adelita, what is going on? What did you get into?" Aaliyah whispered softly.

"I think it's time we find out." Leo declared. Aaliyah nodded in agreement and they both moved from the roof to the fire escape and they landed in front of the two armed men. Both of turtle warriors disarmed the men with their razor sharp weapons then the two of them kicked the two men against the wall as if they were moving in synch.

"Why are you looking for Aaliyah and Adelita?" Leo demanded as he placed his katana against the throat of one man. He saw no value in revealing that one of those girls was standing right next to him. She followed suit with her bunrei against the throat of the other man.

"Why should we answer your questions?" The man asked. "You think you're going to kill us? It won't get you anything if you do."

Aaliyah took a deep breath. This wasn't exactly something she had wanted to reveal either but she thought it might be the only way. "What do you want with my sister?" She demanded.

They looked at the female turtle stunned, as if they were trying to figure out if she was the one they wanted, whether it was the one their boss was trying to track or if she was another sister they didn't know about.

"Answer me." Aaliyah said to them, her voice going from the sad gentleness of their rooftop conversation to sounding a lot like Raph when he was on the verge of losing his temper. "Why do you want her?"

"Calm down." Leo said to her softly. He was already sure if she lost it and killed one or both of them she would never recover from it, even if these guys seemed to have it coming. He then turned his own glare on the guy he had his katana too. "What. Do. You. Want. With. Them?" he questioned slowly.

"Adelita pissed off the boss, and he wants to make her pay by killing everyone she cares about before taking her himself." The guy explained, the attitude of the two turtle combined with the sharp weapons putting him on edge.

"Mom, dad." Aaliyah whispered softly.

"Did you kill their parents?" Leo demanded.

"We didn't." The man answered with a glare. "But they should be dead right now."

Leo glanced at Aaliyah's stricken face. He used his free hand to back Aaliyah off of them and then used the blunt end of his swords to knock them both out. In the turmoil the guy the two had been interrogating slipped away but he blue masked leader wasn't concerned. He was clueless.

"What if they're right?" Aaliyah asked him softly. "What if mom, dad, and Adelita are…" She couldn't finish it off.

Leo enveloped her in a hug. She pressed her face against his chest tightly and he could feel her crying a little. "I think we can get Donnie to find out about your parents." Leo said to her softly. "As for your sister, Adelita, I think she's still alive."

Aaliyah looked at him as she tried to wipe the tears from her face. She finally had to settle with pulling the mask to her neckline. "How can you be sure?" She asked him.

"What the man said." Leo answered simply. "They're trying to find the both of you. Their boss won't go after her until he's sure you're dead." He stroked her cheek softly. "And I won't let that happen."

Aaliyah fell into his arms again, trying to draw comfort from him. After a few minutes it seemed to work as her crying subsided though she still looked very unsure. "What do we do now?" She asked in a soft voice.

"We go back to the lair." He answered her gently. "Splinter and the others need to know what's going on. Maybe Renet can shed some light on something despite her temporal oath."

"Temporal oath?" She asked and giggled a little despite herself. "Space Heroes again."

Leo shrugged and gave her a small smile. "Some things from there are appropriate to life, especially ours." He said.

They headed toward the nearest manhole cover and Aaliyah said softly, "Sorry we couldn't do anything to assuage your concerns about the vigilante."

Leo shrugged it off. "We found something more important to worry about Aaliyah." He said as he stroked her arm gently and then leaned down to get the manhole cover.

Both turtles returned to the lair twenty minutes later to find a surprise waiting for them. Raph was up, looking tired but was drinking some coffee. He looked remarkably okay for someone who hated to be disturbed. Of course beside him was the reason why, as Jennifer was awake too with a barely untouched soda. Karai was pacing the living room too, and seemed to be glad that the two of them were back.

The blonde stood up the instant she saw the two of them, and with only a glance to Leo and then the two girls she was up and at Aaliyah's side, giving her a warm embrace.

"What's up?" Leo asked.

"You tell me." Raph said somewhat grumpily but concern evident in his voice. "I got Jennifer waking me up like forty minutes ago, all upset and saying something was wrong."

"And I could hear her hysterics from my room." Karai added. "Granted I'm a light sleeper but when I saw things were safe here I couldn't figure out what she was so upset about." Leo could detect just enough concern in her voice, not only for them but for Jennifer as well, that let the blue masked turtle know there was more to what it sounded like than the annoyance her words seemed to convey.

Leo looked to the two girls. "Did Jennifer somehow sense Aaliyah's pain?" He said, more to himself than to anyone else.

"What pain?" Raph asked more curiously.

Leo looked to his elder younger brother. "Wake up Donnie, Mikey, and Renet. I'm going to wake up Master Splinter. We need to have a talk." Leo ordered solemnly. Raph amazingly chose not to argue and went to do as he asked.

Jennifer led Aaliyah to the couch and sat next to her. "I'm going to text April and Casey." She told Leo. "I have this feeling they should be here." Leo nodded his agreement.

Ten minutes later Splinter made tea for himself, Leo and Aaliyah as Mikey and Renet helped themselves to some sodas. The apprentice time mistress sat on Aaliyah's other side and whispered, "Did something happen?"

"You tell me." Aaliyah countered softly, sounding just a bit bitter. "What do you know about my family? Should they be dead now? Has something just happened to them?"

Renet shook her head. "No." She answered, and by the tone of her voice the female turtle knew she was speaking the truth. "They should be alive and well." Still, Renet considered what Pizza Face had done when he shouldn't have and wondered if something happened without her knowledge.

"Alright Leo." Donnie said to his oldest brother. "Can you guys tell us what's going on?"

"Not until April and Casey get here." Leo answered firmly. "They are as much family as everyone else."

Donnie nodded his understanding, and was a little surprised when Leo went over and knelt down next to Aaliyah, taking the female turtle's hands gently in his own.

Both Jennifer and Renet exchanged small smiles, feeling some happiness that Aaliyah and Leo seemed to have connected. Both were afraid though that that might clash with something that could end up horribly.

Ten minutes later April showed up and she went to check on Aaliyah too, then after a few minutes of comfort went to Donnie, shaken herself. The red head had noticed that Aaliyah lacked a certain amount of self-assurance that she had never seen before. Not long after Casey showed up with donuts as he sat by Karai and gave her a quick peck on the cheek.

"What is going on Leonardo? Aaliyah?" Splinter demanded to know softly but firmly.

"I'm sorry sensei, but I had to go out and see if I could learn anything about this vigilante that we saw on the news earlier." Leo started which did earn a small look of disapproval from his rat master. "Aaliyah went with me and we…talked. We connected." He smiled just a little as he thought of their kiss, and even Aaliyah's mood seemed to lighten just a bit.

"This can't be what you brought us down here for, right?" Casey asked with just a small bit of annoyance. He was all for them being happy but he thought that news could have waited until a decent time of the day.

"That's not it." Jennifer said to the vigilante perhaps a little harshly than she needed too. "Something upset Aaliyah, something I could feel from here."

"What happened?" Splinter asked, more softly.

"We found a couple guys interrogating this other guy about Aaliyah's whereabouts." Leo explained. "Apparently a gambler of some sort."

"Harry." Casey provided. "Low life guy who spends time gambling on various outcomes. Nothing's been proven but it's been whispered that he kills those who he bets on and they fail."

"I've heard that too." Karai agreed. "Even Shredder wouldn't gamble on him. No pun intended."

"They wanted me dead, they hinted my parents…might be dead, and they wanted to know…" Aaliyah hesitated as she knew only Renet had known this before tonight.

"They wanted to know where your sister Adelita is." Renet filled in with a gasp. "Oh my gosh. But…how is that possible, she should be in California right now."

"I don't think she is." Aaliyah said to Renet. "They were looking for her, they wanted me dead before they…took care of her, whatever that means."

"Wait." Mikey said. "I'm no genius but even I realize that if Renet knows something, then shouldn't it be right."

"Should be." Donnie agreed.

"Unless someone is tampering with time." Renet said softly.

"Donatello, can you find out if Aaliyah's parents are alive?" Splinter asked. He didn't want to upset the white masked turtle girl by implying they weren't.

"It'll take time, but yes." Donnie said.

"Please proceed." Splinter replied and April agreed to help Donnie search.

"Meanwhile we must start forming a search pattern." Splinter said to them all. He looked to his eldest son and their female turtle friend. He noted that Leo still held her hands. "If your sister is in this city, we must find her before they send someone else to do so."

As the Donnie turned on his laptop and April turned hers on, the red head considered what was said. "Donnie, could Jennifer be developing empathic power?" She asked him.

"Maybe." Donnie answered. "We haven't discovered the extent of what was done to her or what effects those experiments have had on her." He shrugged a bit. "We will have to look into that when things settle down, right now we have a bigger concern."

Neither of them noticed the story on the front of their webpage, which reported two men had attacked the hotel where Aaliyah would have been staying at if she had made her tournament as planned, and that their rampage had been stopped by the armored vigilante that Leo and Aaliyah had gone out looking for in the first place.

Not the most romantic encounter ever but needed for the story and it at least brought Leo and Aaliyah on their start together. Who is this vigilante? Can they find Aaliyah's family? What new threats are about to present themselves? The adventure will continue.


	44. Sister Search part 1

Donnie: TMNT is not owned by Myra but by Nickelodeon. Any OC's are a different matter. The new charrie coming in now is not owned by Myra but is from both the '03 Turtles show and the idw comics with the natural unique spin for this series. Part of this plot also originates from the '87 TMNT series.

Mikey: Where we all looked like dorks.

Raph: Again, don't be stupid you moron (smacks Mikey in the back of the head)

Donnie: Yeah, have a little respect for our predecessors.

Karai: Let's just get on with the story.

The search for Aaliyah's missing sister was put on a small hold as through all the chaos they had forgotten one thing. April and Casey had to return to school. The two of them were more than willing to have a late start but Splinter would not hear of it.

"Donatello must continue his search for her parents so we know who all we are exactly looking for." He had explained to them. "And I will not let you two neglect your education for anything, as it is will be vitally important to you in the future."

Of course he was right, especially since if April continued her relationship with Donnie as she currently wanted she would most likely be the provider for them. Karai was a bit more of an enigma as she was half human, but there was still the danger of the Shredder coming after her.

It was reluctantly conceded that the Turtles would do what they could to find information from the underground sources while Jennifer, Renet and Karai would see what they could learn on their own. Karai had a few resources she could check with and they could always keep an ear out for anything else from there.

April waited for Casey to pull his books out of his locker, but it was taking a good minute as Casey was kind of letting loose as he did so. "I mean seriously Red, if something really bad is going down we should be out there doing something about it." He said to her. "I mean Aaliyah's parents might be dead, no one knows if her sister is coming here or not."

April sighed softly. "Casey we don't even know for sure that there's anything go on." She reminded him. "I mean Aaliyah believes there is and that's enough to be looking into it but those guys could have been just trying to psych any of us out too."

Casey looked at her dubiously. "Do you really believe that?" He questioned.

April frowned in thought. "Honestly, I don't." She admitted. "Something tells me that Aaliyah is pretty logical enough to not believe something out of the blue without some sort of proof. The fact that someone even knew where she was is already suspicious."

They turned to see a brawny kid shoving his way past some of the others. Casey glared at him, already hating him but April stopped him. "Like a river over stone." April reminded him. "He's not really doing anything aside from being rather rude."

That changed when he demanded a group of freshman give him their lunch money. One of them tried to refuse and he got shoved hard into the wall. Then when a freshman girl tried to say something he had no problems with reaching out and smacking her in the face.

"That tears it." Casey decided as he dropped his books on one of the locker shelves. Even April 's temper had flared at that. Both were about to step up to that when someone else came down the stairs and shoved him hard.

"Back off of them." The girl, who seemed to be a petite Latina ordered. She had dropped her bag on the stairs as well. Her crystal blue eyes glared at him with super annoyance and even some hatred. She didn't seem all that strong but she was certainly agile looking.

"You'll regret getting in my way." He said as he stood up and aimed a punch at the girl's face that might have even caught April or Casey off guard. She saw it coming though and blocked it, then twisted his arm back harder than either of them would have had thought possible.

"As if." The girl laughed. "You think you're so good, but you don't have what it takes to scare me off." She said. April had to admire her confidence. It was then that Casey whistled a bit.

"Hey, you're already dating someone," April reminded him. Needless to say she wasn't Karai's biggest fan but she still wanted to make sure the kunoichi got whatever she could, including a loyal boyfriend.

"Nah, I don't mean it like that Red." Casey said and pointed to her hand. "See on the web of her right hand between thumb and finger." April followed his view and saw what looked to be two tear drops tattooed onto the skin.

"So?" April asked, not getting it.

"April, she's had two visits to a youth authority camp." He said and at the red head's uncomprehending face he let off a small sigh. "That means she's been arrested twice in the past. If one wants to say there's a bad ass in school, she'd be it."

"Then why is she standing up to him?" April wondered. She didn't want to know how Casey would know what that meant; all she knew was that he didn't have the same marks on the webs of his hands.

"Must have really had a change of heart." Casey replied.

Just as it looked like he might have been considering pressing another attack on the girl a couple of teacher's had shown up courtesy of another student who had been smart enough to get some help rather than take it upon themselves.

"Angel Noche, we've been watching you, waiting for you to screw up." One of them said to her. She managed to look both angry and upset about the fact they were jumping to a conclusion about her.

"Hey." Casey said. "She didn't do anything wrong. She was trying to stand up to this jerk." He pointed to the guy who gave Casey a death glare. The vigilante could care less, he faced down things worse than him, Tiger Claw coming immediately to mind.

"She was only getting them to back off of the new students." April also defended her. They looked between the two. They were pretty much ready to disregard what Casey would say as his rep was little better but the fact that April was stepping up forced them to have to reconsider the situation.

With a bit of prompting the freshman also said the same thing and it was the guy who was dragged off. The freshman made their hasty departures. "Thanks for that." Angel said, rather reluctantly, to April and Casey. "I…didn't expect that, we don't even know each other."

"You did the right thing." Casey told her and April added, "You shouldn't be punished for that."

"Well, thanks again." Angel said to them. The bell rang and as April and Casey started one way and she another she added, "Maybe I'll see you around sometime."

The two of them actually did try to find her during the lunch hour but weren't able to do so. They also saw no sign of Angel on the way out of school but in that regard they didn't spend much time as they wanted to reach the lair and find out how things were going searching for Adelita.

They showed up in the lair where Leo and Aaliyah were sitting on the couch. "Donnie finding nothing yet could be a good sign." He pointed out.

"Or they made sure bodies couldn't be found." Aaliyah said softly.

Leo reached out and hugged her. "Aaliyah, they want your sister to know what's going on. They're not going to make things harder to find." He said though in truth it was of very little comfort. He kissed her on the cheek lightly. "We'll figure it out and make it right." He added.

"So Donnie's internet search hasn't found anything yet?" April asked as she pushed past the turnstile. Casey jumped over it.

"Not yet." Leo said.

"And we didn't catch anything on the streets either." Karai added as she came in from the kitchen with a water bottle in hand. Jennifer and Renet were behind her with their own water bottles. The kunoichi went over and gave Casey a peck on the cheek.

"Raph and Mikey are on their way back." Jennifer added. "But from the text Raph sent me they came up short too."

"It's so weird how impossible this whole finding information thing is supposed to be." Casey noted.

"Once the sun sets we're going to split up into teams of two and see what we can find out that way." Leo told them all. "That was how Aaliyah and I ran into them after all."

"Better make it threes." Renet interjected. "I think I better go back, at least long enough to find out if something's changed." She looked to everyone present and stopped at Aaliyah. "If something bad has happened to your family I can tell you it's not what was supposed to happen. If someone is messing with time we need to know sooner rather than later."

"Good thinking Renet." Leo agreed.

"Jones and I will run to Murakami's first and get food." Karai said. "We're going to have a long night ahead of us." The kunoichi looked to the kind of strange girl that had none the less seemed to capture the heart of her youngest brother. "Are you at least staying for dinner?"

Rent nodded. "Count on it." She said.

Mikey and Raph arrived, confirming the text the red masked turtle sent to his girlfriend. Renet told Mikey and Raph what she was going to do and the orange masked turtle freaked just a little bit until Renet assured him she would be back by tomorrow morning at the latest and that seemed to help.

Karai and Casey came back with dinner. As they ate Leo gave them the break down. "Alright, with Renet going to see what she can learn, here's the plan; Raph, April and Casey will go one way. Karai, you go with Jennifer and Aaliyah. That leaves myself, Mikey and Donnie." He reached for his water and took a drink. "We'll keep up like that until midnight. Then Casey and April should head home and get some sleep for school."

That drew an eye roll from Casey and chuckle from Karai. Otherwise they kept silent and listened. "Then Raph will join up with the girls and we'll meet back here by three." Leo added.

"Needless to say I'm guessing if we hear anything about Aaliyah's sister we should all get in contact." Karai surmised. Leo nodded in confirmation.

A few minutes later Renet stood up. She had used the interval before dinner to change back into the clothes she wore when she had first shown up. She kissed Mikey on the lips gently. "Spicy." She remarked as she licked some of the spice off of her lips. "I'll be back soon all." She waved goodbye as she opened up the time door and stepped through it.

They made a quick clean up and then left the lair in their designated teams. Mikey looked over at Leo. "Any reason you had Jennifer and Karai go with Aaliyah?" He asked his oldest brother curiously. He figured the blue masked leader would want to be there for his white masked turtle girlfriend.

"You mean instead of me." Leo said pointedly and Mikey shrugged. "It's fine Mikey." He said. "I think Aaliyah and I have a special connection, the kind that you share with Renet or Donnie with April." He didn't mention Raph and Jennifer or Casey and Karai because neither was there. "But right now Aaliyah needs Jennifer, whom she has come to see as a sister in her own right. And if we can't be there Karai is the next best thing."

For the next few hours Aaliyah, Karai and Jennifer searched the city via rooftop and Karai was again surprised at the fact that Jennifer was handling herself very well. But they hadn't run into anything yet.

The three turtles patrolled the outskirts of the city while Raph, April and Casey patrolled the inner portions of the city, skirting through alleyways and side streets.

"Man, so far nothing." Casey noted. He was annoyed they hadn't found anything and soon he and April would have to go home for school the next day while the others continued the search.

"We still have some time Casey." April told him. "Let's try to make the most of it."

Not too much longer passed before there was an explosion in the sky loud enough for all in the city to hear. Leo, Mikey and Donnie were close enough that the purple masked turtle could tell what it was. "I'm seeing a small alien spacecraft." Donnie to his two brothers. "It's headed straight for the lake in Central Park."

"Let's get over the and see what we can do." Leo said as he led his two brothers to the park area.

Further in the city Raph had made the same decision and was leading April and Casey to Central Park.

Aaliyah and Karai looked at each other as if they debating not only what decision to make but who should make that decision. Jennifer kind of watched and waited to see what the two would decide, they were both the leader types and honestly they hadn't really discussed who was in charge while the groups were split up.

That became a moot point when they were approached from three sides by several strange looking men that almost looked like the Kraang bio droid suits that they used when trying to 'blend' in. Then one of them looked to Aaliyah. "That's the turtle girl that they ran into last night." He announced.

"So you're the clowns that they ran into huh?" Karai noted as she drew her tonta.

"Careful." Aaliyah advised the kunoichi as she withdrew her bunrei. "They might be associated with those guys but something about them seems off."

"Duly noted." Karai stated as they started to approach the three girls.

Jennifer had out her batons and as one tried to grab her she shot out and slammed one her weapons into his head. He stepped back but other than that looked basically unhurt. "That is not a good sign." She noted to her friend. "Didn't even feel that blow to the head."

"Then we better get ready for one hell of a fight." Karai declared as she moved to engage the closest to her. "And be extra careful Aaliyah because you're the one they want."

The three turtles made it to Central Park first. "Where is the ship?" Mikey asked as he looked up into the sky. "Did we miss it?"

Donnie was the first to see the streak of light and more importantly another explosion. "We haven't missed it." He announced. "And judging by its trajectory it's going to land square in the lake." Sure enough the purple masked turtle's prediction proved accurate as a small but sleek metal looking ship crash landed with a large splash into the water.

"Do we even know if anyone is in that wreck?" Mikey asked.

"We have to find out." Leo said. "Come on." The three turtles headed toward the lake and dove right in. It took a moment for their eyes to even adjust between the darkness and how murky the water was. Mikey pointed at a fish and Donnie rolled his eyes as Leo tapped his arm and pointed straight ahead, basically ordering the orange masked turtle to stay focused.

They had to swim a little bit but found the small sinking ship. Donnie was almost tempted to label it more as an escape pod but he could see little details on it that looked like the sort of engines that was on Space Heroes, and he could believe some alien races would develop something like it.

Leo was the first there and thinking of his favorite show he was already looking for some sort of button that could open up the hatch they were looking at. Donnie however wasn't so convinced it would be that easy and took out his bo staff, thankful he had made sure the wood on this weapon was water sealed, and extended the blade to make it a naginata and began to pry at the hatch. Mikey joined in a moment later with his kusarigama chain. Together the two of them managed to pry open the door and Leo quickly swam into the ship and found an unconscious alien that was about half their size, the blue masked turtle assumed the alien to be male and he had smooth skin, more so that anyone would expect even a baby to have.

Together the three turtles swam back toward the surface. They broke the water and immediately swam toward shore. Donnie could hear the alien's shallow breathing and suspected that he was near death already, and that was before the influx of lake water into his ship.

"What do we do Donnie?" Mikey asked. If anyone could figure out alien physiology it would be him.

But Donnie shrugged. "I don't know, I'm pretty sure he's dying but I don't know enough about his physiology to know if there's anything that could be done." He answered.

"Do not worry about that." The alien rasped, his voice sounding like he had phlegm in his throat though they weren't sure if it was natural for his species or not. "What matters is finding the jewels that were on my ship?"

"I didn't see any jewels." Mikey said.

"There were several breaches in the craft." Donnie noted. "They could have been blown out of the ship upon entering our atmosphere. They could be anywhere in the northern hemisphere, assuming they survived the entering the atmosphere as they couldn't have been protected the way the ship was."

The alien coughed. "No, you're wrong." He took a deep breath. "The jewels were found after the remnants of a supernova, they can easily survive atmospheric reentry." He coughed again. "But…they also absorbed the energies of the supernova."

"Is that possible?" Leo asked Donnie.

Again the purple masked turtle shrugged. "I don't know for sure, but if I had to guess anything could be possible." He answered.

"Absorbing the energy of the supernova…allowed it to become pretty powerful individually…let alone together." The alien coughed again and closed his eyes a moment. Then he opened them again. "You must find the jewels…the eyes of sarnath."

"How do we do that?" Leo asked him.

The alien pulled out a small chip, then almost dropped it but Donnie caught it. He was immediately positive he could interface it with his T-phone and possibly even create an app so that the others could use the tracer as well. "This will lead you to them, regardless of where they are in the world." He answered.

"What do we do with them afterwards?" Mikey asked.

The alien took a deep breath. "The armor…" He started but then coughed again, and it was followed by a gagging sound. With a death rattle the alien grew still.

"What armor?" Mikey questioned.

"Forget it Mikey." Leo said. "He's gone."

Karai found that trying to cut into her opponents wasn't accomplishing anything and she was so engrossed in combat she missed something vitally important that she heard Aaliyah make the observation on. "No matter how much we cut into these guys they don't bleed."

Something in Karai's mind clicked and she jumped over her opponent and as she landed she thrust her tonta in the back of his opponent. It stopped and seemed to spark before flopping onto the ground. "They're robots, though it seems they're more sophisticated than the Footbots the Kraang made for the Foot, or even their own bio droids."

"We should probably take one back to Donnie." Jennifer noted. "You know, assuming we get out of this alive."

"We will." Karai assured confidently.

Jennifer extended the blades from her batons and as she dodged a follow up attack from her opponent she struck the bladed end right into the things head and it followed the plunge to the ground.

"So these things weren't sent by the Kraang." Aaliyah said. "Who did send them?" She wasn't sure that anyone her sister could have pissed off, unjustly or otherwise, could have access to this.

A few in the back cocked their heads. "We have found what we're looking for." One of them announced. With that they all turned their backs on their opponents and started to run down Berkeley street. The three girls hesitated only an instant to make sure they were all in agreement before following them.

"Are they talking about your sister?" Karai questioned the female turtle.

"I don't know, but that would be my guess." Aaliyah replied.

Mikey looked to his older brothers. "What do we do with him?" He asked his brothers. As if that were the cue though the body seemed to dissolve into ashes that would quickly be lost. "Um, okay, question answered. So what do we do? Do we do what he wanted?"

"I don't see that we have a choice." Donnie answered. "If these things are as powerful as he's lead us to believe we have to make sure that no one gets their hands on these jewels…these eyes of sarnath."

"What about Aaliyah's sister?" Mikey reminded.

"We have to find her first." Leo decided, hoping he wasn't letting the personal feelings he was developing for the female turtle interfere with his better judgement. "Then we find these eye of sarnath pieces."

They then saw several portals open up and out stepped several dozen Kraang droids lead by none other than Kraang Commando, who at the moment was in his own chosen bio droid body. "Surrender the chip and you may walk away alive." Kraang Commando stated.

The three turtles exchanged glances. They had been so busy talking the portals had caught them by surprise and had not been able to draw their weapons. They knew however one thing, they could not let the Kraang find these jewels if they were that powerful.

Karai was pleasantly surprised that both Jennifer and Aaliyah could keep up with her as she kept up with these weird robots. Of course she realized she shouldn't be, after all Aaliyah was just as skilled as she and Leo were and what Jennifer lacked in fighting ability she made up for with her endurance, stamina and agility.

They turned the corner and found that the end of the street was blocked out by construction. This also served as a corner because there was nowhere to really go. There were even more of these robots and that did not sit well with the girls.

Simply by scaling a nearby fire escape they could see what the robots were trying to do. They were working their way past a few obstacles where they could make out a young woman trying to figure out how to get further into the construction area without being hurt. She had long black hair that ended halfway down her bag, and even from there they could see she was curvaceous. Her blue jeans was missing most of the left leg and her shirt seemed to have some blood on it though no one could tell from where or even if it was fresh.

One thing was clear to the female turtle. "Adelita." She gasped, suddenly afraid for her older sister, being steps away from being caught by these robots, for whatever reason.

Can the girls get to Aaliyah's sister in time? Who sent the robots after her? How will the three turtles get rid of the Kraang? Is there anyone else involved in this race for the eyes of sarnath? The adventure continues.


	45. Sister Search part 2

Raph: Nickelodeon owns TMNT. OC's are not owned by Nickelodeon. Half this plot has basis from the '87 series.

Jennifer had a feeling Aaliyah wasn't exactly in a strategic frame of mind right now. She gently laid her hand on the white masked turtle's shoulder and looked to Karai. "We have to get over there and help Adelita, but how do we get past these things?" She asked.

The kunoichi looked around. The fire escapes ended a little before the robots did. She knew the roof could make it that far but then they would be risking injury at the construction area and she figured that the robots weren't so concerned about that. "We have to cross the roofs and over those lamp posts to get in front of them." She announced.

"That's pretty dangerous." Jennifer noted.

"Any better ideas?" Karai asked her.

She didn't. Aaliyah made that point clear to. "We don't have a choice, that's the only way to intercept these robots before they get their hands on my sister." She said. The blonde nodded in consent and they scaled the fire escape and on top of the roof and started to quickly roof jump to the lamp post they needed.

As they crossed the roof Karai noticed two of the robots getting over the barrier and near Adelita who was not prepared to out run them. She took out two shurikens and tossed them straight at their heads. They hit home and the two of them fell to the ground, also hitting a couple others on the way down too. The girl didn't seem to notice what happened.

Crossing the roof was easy. Jumping to the lamp post was also easy enough. The tricky part was getting onto the ground. Karai and Aaliyah could easily make that jump because of their intense training, though of course Karai's was more intense thanks to the Shredder. Jennifer was more hesitant but after a second she sheathed her weapons, knelt down and did a nice twirl around the top of the lamp post before landing on her feet, to her credit stumbling just a little and recovering almost immediately with her weapons drawn.

"Impressive." Karai granted. "Gymnastics pays dividends again." The kunoichi could see from a glance Aaliyah wanted to at least check on her sister and she looked to the female turtle. "We could really use your help here, so make it quick."

Aaliyah nodded though her eyes did show how grateful she was that Karai would even consider that under the circumstances.

Speaking of circumstances, they were not ideal for Leo, Mikey and Donnie. They had just watched the mysterious alien pass away and fade to ashes after receiving a chip that he said would allow them to track mysterious jewels called the eyes of sarnath. Then the Kraang had shown up and they had not been quick enough to draw their weapons. To make it worse they were accompanied by Kraang Commando, the lasts in the line of unique Kraang creatures.

"Surrender that which is known as the tracking chip or those that are known as the turtles will be known as the turtles that are no more." A Kraang echoed his commander's earlier demand only seconds ago.

"Not in this lifetime." Raph stated as he flipped in front of that Kraang and used his sais to disarm the droid of the laser and drive the sai into the droid's head. April was behind and them and used her tessen's to take out the legs of two of the Kraang droids. Casey aimed his hockey stick straight into the stomach of the Kraang droid nearest him, which for the Kraang was like a head shot. The Kraang fell unconscious from the impact.

"Let's do it guys." Mikey said as he drew his nunchuck's. Leo drew his katana blades and Donnie took just a moment to slap the card into his T-phone before drawing his bo staff and following his brothers into battle.

Taking out the Kraang droids was easy enough but Kraang Commando slammed his fist down hard. April and Mikey just barely dodged the attack. Donnie jumped up and kicked him in the chest though it didn't seem to have much impact.

"Give me that chip you pathetic reptile." Kraang Commando demanded of Donnie. The purple masked turtle dodged the attack that followed it.

"Not a chance." Donnie responded.

Mikey tried to use his kusarigama chain to slow down Kraang Commando but the augmented strength of his bio droid was easily able to break free from it. "Dude, I don't know which one is worse. This one or Kraang Subprime's Irma one." He commented.

"Well that one packed lasers." Donnie pointed out. "And the head moved on its own."

"Also I think Subprime sounds more annoying than Commando." Casey added as he swatted a Kraang droid down and out.

"I can't argue the annoyance." Kraang Commando said. "But let's see what we can do about those lasers." With that Kraang Commando jumped out of his bio droid body. He himself took his alternate form where he grew to be about the turtle's size and got more tentacles springing from his body. The body itself expanded and folded out. Lasers extended from either side of the legs, the hands pulled back to make five sided mini guns on either arm as well as from the elbows. The same sort of gauntlet gun emerged from its chest and even the eyes glowed red, signaling lasers there too. "I've been upgrading since you and the Mutanimals attacked our Jersey base and thwarted the invasion."

"I guess he's got a good upgrade plan." Mikey noted with some trepidation.

"Let' see what we can do to cut it down to size." Leo decided. That plan fell a little short when the bio droid turned toward Leo and unleashed three laser gauntlet blasts straight at the blue masked leader. "Somehow." He added.

"Yeah, awesome." Raph replied sarcastically. "Any ideas how we're going to pull this one off fearless?"

Leo didn't want to tell his brother that he honestly had no idea right now.

Donnie however voiced his opinion. "If we could plug up those gauntlet laser pieces we might be able to cause a feedback in the bio droid." He dodged the eye lasers that were aimed at him. "The energy being used for the blasts would have nowhere to go but back to whatever source is producing them.

"How do we do that?" Mikey asked as he dodged one of the gauntlet lasers.

"What about some rocks?" Casey asked.

"It'd blast through those things like Styrofoam." April replied. "We need something stronger."

"What could we use then Red?" Casey asked her.

Leo glanced around. He wasn't sure, as they were in Central Park. All the they had around them was grass, trees, some rocks, the water, miscellaneous parts for the fallen Kraang droids…"I got it." Leo said. "Raph, give me hand. Let's get some of those Kraang droid fingers."

"Good idea." Donnie said. "It obviously has to be able to block that kind of energy." He looked to Mikey, April and Casey. "We're going to have to keep that bio droid distracted."

"Uh bros…" Mikey started as he was about to point out one thing before Kraang Commando made that point moot by slamming right into the orange masked turtle.

"April, call the girls." Leo ordered.

Aaliyah headed toward her sister and Adelita looked almost as afraid of her as she had of these robot things chasing her. "Adelita, hold on." Aaliyah said. "You don't need to be afraid, it's me Aaliyah."

The slightly older girl stopped and looked at the female turtle carefully. She looked closely, particularly the face. Despite the obvious physical changes she could swear she could see her little sister's cheeks in the face, even some distinction with the nose. The most telling to her though was that this female turtle shared her little sister's eyes. "Aaliyah." She breathed confused.

"It's me." Aaliyah said softly as she approached her sister.

"What happened?" Adelita asked her.

"It's…a pretty long story." Aaliyah told her. "At least for now." She reached out and took her older sister's hand. She squeezed gently and Adelita squeezed back. "Stay here. Don't move. I need to help my friends deal with these robot things, but once they're gone we'll get you to a safe place and then we'll talk."

Adelita nodded. She wanted so badly to trust her sister despite their tumultuous history. "I'll stay here." She promised. "Please be careful, they still want to kill you too."

"I noticed." Aaliyah promised dryly. "My two friends will help keep me safe and if we need to we have other friends we can call." With another quick squeezing of hands, Aaliyah let her older sister's hands go and drew her bunrei's. She jumped right into the foray, feeling better for the first time in almost two days.

Karai and Jennifer were holding their own despite the numbers disadvantage. The blonde was a bit more worn out since she hadn't been training for this kind of combat nearly as long as either Aaliyah or the kunoichi but was still going strong for the moment.

"She's safe." Aaliyah informed the two of them. "So let's do this."

"At what point do we call Raph and everyone else?" Jennifer asked.

Karai bit her lip. In truth she was wondering that too. These robots seemed almost as endless as the Kraang droids they had seen, or even the Footbots she used to help command. "I don't know." She finally admitted. "There's still that explosion in the sky that we never got to get to. They might be there right now."

At that point their T-phones went off. Jennifer took a step back, trusting Aaliyah and Karai to keep her safe for a few minutes. She answered the T-phone. "Hello."

It was April on the other end. "We've got problems down in Central Park." She told her blonde friend. "Apparently there was some kind of alien craft that crashed and before he died he gave something to Donnie that the Kraang want. Kraang Commando updated his bio droid and we're trying to deal with it and Kraang Commando. We need some kind of backup." She explained.

Jennifer grimaced slightly even though of course the red head couldn't see it. "We're not doing any better." The blonde responded. "We did find Adelita but she's being chased by more of these weird robot things than we can count." She sighed a bit. "Truth be told we were debating when to call you guys for help."

April sighed just a bit. "Great, we're both in hot water." She giggled just a moment. "I'm sure we both wish Renet had stuck around right now. At least she would be around to help one of our teams." Though the blonde couldn't see it she bit her lip. "Try to hold out. We'll do what we can here and then join you there."

Both girls exchanged be careful's for the team and then disconnected.

Karai looked to Jennifer when she came out to help again. "I heard just enough to know that we're on our own." She said. The kunoichi wasn't too surprised given how things seemed to work for them but things did not look good.

"No go guys." April said to them. "We're on our own. The girls have their own major robo problems."

"Screw that then." Raph said and he looked to Leo. "You deal with Kraang Commando while the others deal with bio droid. I'll get these damn fingers off of the bio droids."

Leo couldn't argue with that logic. "Alright, let's do it."

The blue masked turtle intercepted the mobile tentacled Kraang and began to go at him as best as possible as Mikey, Donnie, April and Casey did their best to distract the gauntlet laser bio droid. It was becoming increasingly harder as they were wearing down but the bio droid was not.

Raph was breaking off fingers from Kraang droids with his sais. It took a minute but it worked. The problem was he estimated that they would need at least fifteen to make Donnie's plan worse and he figured it better to double up on that to try to guarantee that enough would actually get through. That made eight arms he had to pluck of fingers and he only had gotten the second one pruned.

"You know how to end this with your lives intact." Kraang Commando said to Leo. "Give us that chip." This was followed by a tentacle swipe.

Leo chopped it off, which elicited a growl from him but nothing else. "We have no reason to believe what you say, and we wouldn't do it regardless." He replied.

"We've got to come up with something." Aaliyah said to Karai. "We can't keep this up forever and even if we could the others need us."

Karai took off the arm of one of the robots and discovered that wasn't enough as it used its other arm to get Karai right in the jaw. She thanked her lucky stars that her jaw wasn't broken. "I'm open to suggestions." She told her friends.

The idea came not from one of those the kunoichi knew but from the source behind them. "They're robots, electronics. Make them short circuit." Adelita called out. They already knew she was there anyway so calling out wasn't really doing her any harm.

"It really is too bad I can't just poison these things." The kunoichi lamented to herself. Though she was not always fond of her mutant half she knew that right now she had no choice but to accept that, but robots couldn't be poisoned. "How do we do that?" Karai asked.

Jennifer glanced around a bit and then brightened just a bit. "The fire hydrant Karai." She replied.

Karai followed the blonde's gaze and again was pleased about how Raph's girlfriend was pretty good on her feet even if she wasn't the best fighter. "You know what Jennifer?" Karai called out to her. "You can have my back in a fight any day." With that compliment delivered she took out two of her own shurikens and tossed them as hard as she could at the fire hydrant. It was a bit of slow leak, especially under the circumstances but when it finally erupted in a flurry of water the initial burst took out several right then and there and as it started to cascade around others began to follow.

"It's thinning them out." Aaliyah noted happily. "But I don't know if it will be enough."

Several of the robots were swatted aside and from the shadows emerged Muckman. "Hey, looked like you girls could use some help against these metal freaks." He said.

"Great timing garbage dude." Karai replied. "We're a little on the light side over here."

"Where are them turtle guys you hang out with anyway?" The garbage mutant asked.

"They got a little sidetracked elsewhere." Karai answered. She was aware of the fact that Aaliyah was a bit surprised still with his presence and Jennifer was still a little freaked out about him in general. "They're also in pretty big danger, so we're trying to get these things out as quickly as possible."

"Then let's see what we can do to get these things out then." Muckman replied. One thing, for good or ill in most circumstances, was that most cities in the world was full of trash and not only was New York no different but in many ways he was sure had to be the worse. This was when that fact was of benefit however. He gathered up his energies and a windstorm picked up. Trash started to scurry around the area and get picked up with it.

"What's going on now?" Adelita asked her sister and her friends.

Aaliyah went to her sister and ducked her down beside her. "We don't want to get caught up in this." She replied. A moment later both Karai and Jennifer followed the female turtle into the dubious protection of some of the rubble of the construction site.

Through the cracks in the rubble pile they could see the trash tornado picking up and collecting the robots, slamming them all together and causing such velocity that they as they mixed with the trash and the water from the destroyed hydrant it was causing them to short circuit. Within moments it died down but none of the robots recovered from that.

"We better get to the turtles, April and Casey then." Jennifer said.

"Hey Muckman, think you could take a couple of these robot things to your hideout. We'll come get it when things settle down so that Donnie can take a look at these things." Karai called out to the trash mutant.

Much to Adelita's surprise it was not him that answered but instead his left eye slithered out and replied, "Will do." Joe then looked to Muckman. "Let's get a couple of these things together for them Mucky."

Adelita shook her head. "Wow." She said, a mixture of shock and amazement. "So what are we doing now?"

"You can take your sister back to the lair if you want." Karai said to Aaliyah. "We'll meet you there."

"No." Aaliyah said. "I'm coming with you, I have to. For Leo especially."

"Then let's go." Adelita interjected. "Your friends need you."

"We're really running short here bro." Mikey called out to Raph.

"Yeah, I noticed." Raph snapped and then added, "Jones, get over here."

Casey made his way over to him. "You rang?" He asked sarcastically.

Raph ignored his friend's sarcasm. "Look, we can't wait until all of these damn fingers are broken off. Start taking what I have off and plug up those gauntlet holes." He said.

"How are we supposed to get close enough for that?" Casey asked.

Raph rolled his eyes. "You're not supposed to get close, you're supposed to use your hockey playing skills, think of these things as hockey pucks." He reached over and cuffed the vigilante on his left arm. "Don't pull a Mikey."

"Hey." The orange masked turtle protested as he dodged another attack from the bio droid.

Casey took a handful and moved to the side, hoping to make the bio droid lose focus on one target and to get the job done before it set its target at him. Right now it was targeting Donnie. "Donnie, double jump time!" He called out.

The purple masked turtle got the idea instantly. He jumped over the bio droid and then waited for the thing to turn toward him and more importantly Casey's position. Then he jumped again behind it just as the vigilante used the hockey stick to hit five of the Kraang droid fingers straight into the gauntlet blaster on its left arm.

"Great, now we have to do that two more times." Donnie said. "Get a move on Raph."

"I'm workin' on it!" He called back.

"You'll be history before you try to complete that little plan." Kraang Commando told them. "And that assumes it works in the first place." The unique Kraang laughed at them. "I control its firing patterns with my mind."

"That means we're totally screwed then guys." Mikey said worriedly.

"Not true." Leo responded as he jump kicked Kraang Commando. "It might not feedback on itself but it still prevents it from being used as a weapon."

Kraang Commando laughed again. "We'll see what that does for you freaks." He stated and then the bio droid used a smaller mechanical hand to take out another of the portable Kraang devices and tossed it in the air to open another portal. "It's time for some reinforcements. We'll take that chip from your cold dead shells."

They could see the first Kraang droid start to step through when all of a sudden a shuriken shot through the air and impaled itself into the small device. It fizzled out and shut down, chopping the Kraang droid just under half, so the Kraang was fortunate enough not to be stuck on Earth now. "Sorry, but that's not going to work for you." Aaliyah stated. They could see Jennifer and Karai spreading out to help and a girl they didn't know, presumably their friend's older sister Adelita, trying to stay behind a tree and out of the way.

"Is this the best you can do?" Kraang Commando questioned.

"Nope, this is." Casey stated and used five more Kraang droid fingers to plug up the right gauntlet.

"What now?" Mikey asked. "Com dude said he won't let it fire."

"Really?" Karai questioned with a smirk. "Then let's try a different approach then." She sheathed her tonta and then reached down and picked up one of the discarded Kraang droid arms with fingers still attached.

"What are you doing Karai?" Leo asked his sister.

"Watch and learn." She said. She ran toward the bio droid. She was smaller and more nimble than any of her turtle brothers, and that was as a human. But now she did something she hadn't truly done since Stockman had 'restored' her mind, she shifted into that of her mutant snake form. That allowed her even more agility than she had as a human. The bio droid tried to fire the chest laser gauntlet at her but she found that easier to dodge than the bullet she barely intercepted when Tsoi shot at her in the store a few days ago.

"Wow, look at her go." Casey said impressed. "If she pulls off her plan, it'll be awesome."

Lightning quick Karai wrapped her snake tail around the bio droid waist as she rose up to meet it and plunged the digits of the bio droids hand right into the gauntlet laser just as it was getting ready to try to fire at her close range. Then the tail vanished as she assumed her human form and kicked the bio droid in the chest. It stumbled back before exploding, sending all of them flying to the ground a moment. However when they looked up Kraang Commando was gone, having realized this fight was lost.

"We might still be able to find the little worm." Raph said to them.

"Forget that Raph." Leo ordered his red masked brother. "We have the chip and we have more important things to worry about right now."

"How are there more like you?" Adelita asked her younger sister.

Aaliyah laughed a little. "They're not." She answered. "They were born turtles and became what they are whereas, as you know, I was born human and have recently become what I now am."

Adelita shook her head. "I'm confused." She admitted. "Should I start wondering if I have a concussion now?"

"This is real life and I'm pretty sure you don't have a concussion." April said as they all started to approach Adelita. "But I know this will take some time to explain. And we should do that back at the lair."

"What about those robot things that you were talking about?" Mikey asked.

"Yeah, we have to stop by that place that Muckman decided to call home." Karai told her brothers, April and Casey. "He's holding a couple for us so that Donnie can look into what these things are. They're more advanced than anything I've seen, and that includes the Footbots."

"I thought they went down rather easily, especially when Muckman showed up." Jennifer said.

"Probably because they didn't think to do something as simple as waterproofing if they're really that advanced." Donnie speculated.

"We can discuss this more at the lair." Aaliyah said, agreeing with what April had said earlier. "After we've gotten Adelita taken care of."

Unknown to the girls and Muckman a few of the robots had survived. They returned to a building that was almost as tall as the TCRI building the Kraang used for their cover. One of them made their way to the top floor and came into an office.

Behind a comfy desk chair a man asked, "What happened?"

"We found the girl but before we could get our hands on her she was rescued by her sister, the daughter of Shredder, and the daughter of Fulcanelli." The robot reported. "On top of that, there was also interference from the mutant Muckman."

The man released a puff of cigar smoke. "I see." He mused. "We'll have to step matters up here soon enough." He turned to face the robot. "We'll deal with them all soon enough. Get repaired and reassemble your teams. I don't want the turtles getting the eyes of sarnath and using that power to their advantage." He leaned forward a bit and one could just make out the horns on either side of his otherwise bald head. "When they track them, take the jewels and bring them to me."

After they had stopped by Muckman's to get the robot pieces they brought Adelita back to their lair where Donnie got his first aid kit and dropped off the robot pieces to be looked at later then tended to the wounds that he could see. The tension between her and her sister was rather palpable, letting everyone else know there was definitely things they had to work out here.

Mikey turned on Crognard to wind down but the show was interrupted by a news bulletin that reported another robbery had been stopped this evening by the vigilante, but they added in something new. They now gave the vigilante the name Nightwatcher.

"I think it is time that we learn what has happened to ultimately bring you here." Splinter said to Adelita as he came out of the dojo.

The girl looked up at the giant talking rat and that was the last straw to overwhelm her after five giant talking turtles, including one being her sister, and trash monster with his talking eyeball and the horde of robots. She fainted dead away, luckily she was on the couch.

"How often do you have that effect on people?" Casey asked the rat master, which received a glower.

Will the turtles start looking for the eyes of sarnath? What does the mystery demon and the Kraang intend to do with them? Will Aaliyah find out about her family and will she like it if she does? Is Nightwatcher's appearance a coincidence or is there more to it, and who is Nightwatcher anyway? The adventure continues


	46. A World Shattered

Leo: TMNT is owned by Nickelodeon. If you see it on the show it's already owned. OC's are owned by Myra and anything else will be noted when first needed.

Raph: This is all in the first forty plus chapters; do we really need to keep doing this?

Donnie determined that seeing Master Splinter may have been the final shock that caused Adelita to pass out she never the less had been pretty sleep deprived for at least a week and the shock of seeing all of them, especially her sister as a mutant turtle, had probably contributed as well. The best they could do was let her sleep.

After a few hours April and Casey had to say goodnight and go home so they could get enough sleep to go to school. The next day seemed to come too soon. April called Donnie to find out what was going on as they walked toward school to learn that Adelita was still asleep, which didn't surprise the red head that much considering what was going on and that he was using that time to examine the robots though didn't want to go into details over the phone.

The two of them were at their lockers when they heard someone coming from behind them. They both turned, all but ready to attack but stopped that impulse when they saw it was just Angel. Casey however was pretty sure that the Latin girl had noticed their readiness.

"Hey guys." Angel said. "Feeling jumpy?"

"It wasn't a very restful night last night." April said enigmatically.

Angel laughed a little. "Somehow I'm not too surprised to hear that one." She leaned against the locker next to April's. "The news spent half the night going on about the mysterious explosion in the sky that was tracked to Central Park but they haven't found anything so far."

It occurred to April to wonder what would happen if any of those people found the space ship that Donnie had told her had crashed into the lake with the passenger who had given them that chip to track those eye of sarnath things.

"Then there were a couple of reports of that vigilante that they're calling the Nightwatcher now." Casey added. "Stopped another couple of robberies."

"I saw that one too." Angel replied.

"I just hope that person knows what they're doing." April mused. "Even with that kind of get up it's still pretty risky to be fighting crime, especially since there is more out there than simple robbers."

"I bet they have a pretty good idea of what they're getting into." Angel said to the red head. "Maybe not entirely but let's be honest there is no way to be prepared for everything."

April had to laugh a bit at that one as Casey chuckled and said. "You got that right Angel."

The two of them retrieved their books and they started to walk with Angel down the hall, where their different classrooms were as they were still in the same vicinity. "So, you two want to go see a movie or something after school?" She asked them.

"We're going to have to take a rain check on that." April told her, finding she did kind of regret that though they were both concerned about Adelita and what she had to say to her little sister. "We have a friend who's not feeling too well, and she and her sister might need us."

"I could come with you if you want." Angel offered.

The two of them again exchanged glances. Again they wouldn't necessarily mind but it wasn't their secret to give. April also couldn't help but remember that the last time she had brought a stranger to the lair, which had been Irma who had really been Kraang Subprime. "They…don't really like unannounced visitors." Casey stammered out.

Angel suspected they were lying and wasn't sure why. She hoped there was a good reason but she couldn't help but be a little upset by that. They had reached her classroom, which she was glad for because she wasn't sure where to go from there. "This is my stop. Guess I'll see you two later." She said and hurried in quickly.

Casey and April looked at each other, feeling horrible for blowing her off like that. When April said as much Casey smiled softly and placed his hand on her shoulder. "I know, Red. Me too. But we can't guarantee she'll handle five mutant turtles and a mutant rat gracefully." He reminded her. "And we can't take that risk if we can help it."

"I know." April replied softly.

When lunch came they weren't too surprised that they couldn't find Angel. April wasn't sure what they would have done even if they had been able to find her but it didn't make her or Casey feel any better, even though April had to keep reminding herself what happened with 'Irma'.

After school was out for the day they still had not seen Angel, but again they had to rush out in order to go to the lair in case they were needed. Arriving there a half hour later they saw Aaliyah, Leo, Raph, Karai and Mikey in the middle of practice. Jennifer was off to the side practicing a kata and it seemed as if Renet hadn't returned yet. Splinter told the two of them that Donnie had been excused from practice to examine the robots so April went to help him as Casey sat down to watch the others.

A half hour later they had just finished when Adelita emerged from Aaliyah's room, where they had decided to let her sleep in peace. She seemed just a bit surprised to see that a giant rat mutant and five mutant turtles, one being her sister, was a reality but didn't react otherwise.

"Did you sleep well?" Splinter asked her.

"I think so." Adelita said. "Certainly better than I have in at least a week."

"Has it been that rough since I left for the tournament?" Aaliyah asked her older sister as he came and sat next to her.

Adelita took a deep breath. "Yeah, you could say that." She admitted.

Leo came and sat next to Aaliyah, gently taking one of her hands to reassure her, or perhaps to comfort her. Or both. He had a feeling whatever Aaliyah was going to learn from her sister would probably not be a good thing.

"We overheard someone saying you were coming here, though we're not sure if they were a robot or not." Aaliyah said to her sister. "And that…they were looking to kill everyone you cared about first before they did you in."

Adelita nodded softly and looked down. "They did a pretty good job of it too." She whispered.

"Mom and dad…"Aaliyah started to ask but felt a lump in her throat and found she couldn't get the full question out.

She must have known what her little sister was going to ask. "Yeah….they're dead…because of me." She answered quietly.

Aaliyah felt tears spring to her eyes and turned to bury her head against Leo's chest as she started to cry. The blue masked turtle held her tightly and stroked her shell. In other circumstances she might have found the contact rather nice.

"Why did they do that?" Karai asked her. Her mind went to the loss of her mother Tang Shen, whom she barely knew. All because Shredder was jealous of her father and what they had.

"Because of me." Adelita said. "Because of what I did."

"What do you mean?" Jennifer asked her softly.

Adelita took a deep breath. "I fell in love with someone." She answered them all softly. She was sure her little sister could hear everything despite the fact she was still crying against the blue masked turtle though she wasn't sure why. "But that person's brother was in a gang and got angry because our relationship ruined his plans with a rival gang and they decided to get revenge by killing those I cared about before…whatever they have planned for me."

"There really are some true sickos in this world." April said angrily. "Makes the Kraang almost seem decent."

"Almost." Casey added.

"Just what we needed, another gang around here." Raph said. "But I guess if we have to bring the beat down on another group of losers then so be it."

"Where do these robot things come in at?" Mike asked. "Why would they care about Adelita's relationship?"

"I don't think they do." Donnie said. "I think whoever it is that is pursuing Adelita probably asked or paid whoever made those robot things for assistance."

Adelita reached over and placed a hand on her sister's shoulder, finding it a bit weird not to feel human skin but at the same time it didn't feel like the skin of the pet turtle that her fifth grade class had taken care of either. "I tried to call the hotel that you…we were supposed to stay at for the tournament only to be told that there was no one there with your name."

Aaliyah took a nervous breath and then let go of Leo to embrace her sister, and the two hugged each other tightly. "I was afraid that you didn't make it there because they had gotten to you too." Adelita said so quietly that only Aaliyah and Splinter were absolutely sure what was being said. "It never occurred to me that they would've made sure I knew when you were dead."

Aaliyah rubbed her sister's back gently for a moment and then leaned back, taking her older sister's hands in her own. "I showed up at the airport, there was a limo waiting for me, which is what we expected." She started to explain.

"Sweet." Mikey said. "We need to start displaying our ninja skills to the world."

"Michelangelo, do not interrupt." Splinter scolded his youngest son.

"You wouldn't want this limo anyway Mikey." Aaliyah said to the orange masked turtle. "It was a set up. Fulcanelli had apparently been doing his homework and decided I was a good candidate to clash with his enemies, who are now my friends, and kidnapped me only to mutate me into the turtle girl you're seeing before you now." She looked to her sister. "I didn't know what was going on at home and I didn't know how you or our parents would react to this so I…kind of ignored the problem until I could figure out how to handle it."

"That wasn't very nice." Adelita noted with a small bit of amusement. "Even if things hadn't been falling apart in another way we would have been driving ourselves crazy worrying about you."

"I know." Aaliyah admitted softly. "Like I said I hadn't really thought about the problem or how to respond to it appropriately."

"Where you hurt?" Adelita asked her little sister now.

Aaliyah shook her head. "Not really." She replied. "They needed me. But when I got there I had a cellmate named Candy, they had pulled her days earlier from the streets. She was kind of the test subject for the mutagen they used to change us. They turned her into an axolotl mutant. She was the one who usually was made to take the brunt of the frustrations that they had, at least from his lieutenants, especially Hector."

Adelita frowned in sympathy and she also did not fail to notice that the blonde girl next to the red masked turtle flinched as well and she wondered if the girl knew Hector. She looked to the others. "Is this…mutagen stuff the same thing that changed all of you?" She asked.

"Yes." Splinter answered her. "I had recently purchased four turtles after moving from Japan to New York. As I was leaving the pet shop I encountered a few Kraang droids though I did not know that at the time. The mutagen canister they had was split open and since I had recently stepped on a rat's tail, I turned into the form you see before you today."

"Meanwhile our contact with our father turned us half human." Donnie explained. "And we grew up like this for sixteen years."

Adelita had to stop the urge to pass out again from how overwhelming this all sounded, especially when she made the next leap. She looked to her sister. "So this Fulcanelli, what, placed a turtle on you or made one bite you or something?" She questioned.

"Nothing like that." Aaliyah told her sister. "Unlike their mutation mine was intentional. He combined my DNA with that of a turtle, though oddly enough we are the same turtle species."

"If one ignores the fact you were born a human." Casey added and Karai gave him a glare that basically said to keep quiet.

Adelita wasn't quite sure how phrase this question. "Is there…any way…to become human again?" She asked.

"I have developed retro mutagen that in most cases can restore someone to their original form." Donnie answered for her, choosing not to elaborate on the fact that what he had made didn't work on Karai though. "It should be able to restore Aaliyah, Candy, and Master Splinter back to being human if they wanted too."

Adelita looked to her little sister. "Do you know what you want?" She asked her.

Aaliyah hesitated a moment before shaking her head. "Not fully." She answered. "I've thought about it before but I don't know if I want to do it or not."

"Being mutated might have saved your life." April said to Aaliyah gently. "Not that you could have known that at the time but if you hadn't been the guys that killed your parents might have gotten to you too."

"I think so too." Adelita replied softly. "So maybe this happening was a good thing, for at least one reason." She couldn't help but guess that she was attracted to the blue masked turtle, which was okay if you were into that.

"I believe in all of this, we have not introduced ourselves properly." Splinter realized as Adelita looked to him. "I was born Hamato Yoshi but I have gone by Splinter for the last sixteen years. This is my daughter Mi…Karai." He placed his hand gently on the shoulder of the girl he was talking about. He was still not used to calling her the name Shredder had given her but she had shown no indication of going back to her unfamiliar birth name. "These are the turtles I had, who I have come to think of as my sons. Leonardo," He indicated the blue masked turtle that her little sister had turned to first upon hearing about their parents. "Raphael." This to the red masked turtle that sat by the lithe blonde. "Donatello." This to the purple masked turtle that had spoken of the retro mutagen. "And Michelangelo." That was directed toward the orange masked turtle, but she had known that one from when he had scolded his youngest son about interrupting her story.

"I'm April O'Neill." The red head introduced herself.

"Casey Jones." Said the black clad vigilante with a small nod.

"My name is Jennifer Quinn." The blonde introduced herself shyly. Despite all she had learned being around the turtles these last few months she still found meeting new people sort of frightened her.

"I'm glad my sister could find such good people to take care of her when she had to endure a very dramatic change in her life." Adelita said as she looked to each of them. "Thank you for being there for her when I couldn't."

"Aaliyah has told me a lot about your relationship." Leo said to the girl. "It's been very tumultuous. I hope the two of you can repair it while you're here."

"You are welcome to stay here." Splinter said to Adelita. "Like Jennifer when she entered our lives she had no way to survive in this city. It seems as if it is the same for you as well." He looked down at her sincerely. "Any family of Aaliyah's is welcome here as well."

Adelita wasn't sure what to say. "Um…do you even have the room here for me?" She asked.

"Casey and I don't actually live here." April replied. "We just hang out here a lot."

"A lot." Casey echoed with a smirk.

"I've actually been considering ways to expand the lair." Donnie admitted. "I mean in the last two months we've had three people move in that weren't living here for as long as were growing up."

Adelita looked confused. "I haven't agreed to move in yet." She reminded them.

"Donnie wasn't talking about you." Aaliyah told her sister, though she did hope she would agree to do so. She thought it would be good for her sister in the long run, not to mention help them rebuild their relationship. "Karai has only been living here a few weeks."

Now Adelita looked confused. Splinter sighed softly but explained, "I came here from Japan after a former friend of mine who now calls himself the Shredder killed my wife Tang Shen in our fight. For years I thought he had killed my daughter as well but he instead took her to raise his own."

"So I grew up with Shredder thinking my father and the turtles were my enemies." Karai added. "I only recently learned the truth and even then he tried to use these mind control worms to keep me on his side." She had to give a small smile to both the red head and the blonde. "Until those two helped free me from its clutches."

Adelita wondered how the two girls had done that but decided she wasn't sure she wanted to know at that moment. It really was a lot to take in.

Splinter noticed her reaction too and decided to push the subject towards something that would be less likely to overwhelm her. "Donatello, what have you learned about these robots?" He asked his smartest son.

"I'm learning a lot though I can't say I have a full explanation." Donnie answered as he stood up, ready to take the floor and lecture like some teachers that each of the human companions could identify with at some point or another in their academic careers. "The circuitry is more advanced than even what the Kraang use. I don't recognize the alloy used to make their structures either. The skin on these things is very much akin to human skin, probably genetically grown though I don't know how they do it."

"So basically these things are fancy robots." Raph said with an eye roll, wondering why Donnie had to go all sciency when simple phrasing was available.

They didn't notice the time door that opened so were all a bit surprised when they heard Renet say, "They're called Thanosoids. They're constructed using polyzerkonium metal and circuitry that is then fused with dead human flesh." The apprentice time mistress revealed until she added her own, "Which, let me just say eew and gross."

Raph rolled his eyes. "So Renet just confirmed it, fancy robots." He reiterated.

"Well yeah." Renet conceded. "To anyone who doesn't care about the specifics about them." She went over and kissed Mikey a long kiss on his right cheek before sitting next to him. "That was what Lord Simultaneous told me and he wanted me to make sure I said everything in exact detail in case it would help."

"Um, isn't that tampering with time?" April asked her curiously. "I mean, isn't that what he wouldn't want?"

"That's the thing." Renet admitted kind of shyly. "He's hoping giving this information will minimize the extent of the damage." She looked to everyone. "It's like I already thought since Pi…" She cut herself off as not only had they not told everyone about the date that lead them to discover Pizza Face's plan but even Mikey didn't know he shouldn't have had what he did to influence those staff workers. "I mean since Verminator X first showed up. Someone is already messing with the time line."

"So that means…that mom and dad weren't supposed to die then?" Aaliyah asked softly. When the apprentice time mistress nodded sadly and both of the sisters felt the tears brimming in their eyes again.

"Where was the polyzerkonium stuff discovered, how did it come about?" Donnie asked Renet knowing as disturbing as this revelation was right now they could do nothing about it, the change of topic none the less generated another eye roll from his red masked brother. Even April seemed kind of excited about this information though she did seem slightly disgusted about the dead flesh part.

Renet took out a small chip from a side pocket and gave it over to Donnie. "All of the technical information is there, maybe that will help with whatever you want. One thing I did retain is that Lord Simultaneous said the method is similar to how the Revenants are made." She said.

"Revenants?" Adelita asked.

"Skeletal demons that were in my father, Fulcanelli's army." Jennifer revealed softly.

"And Jennifer had nothing to do with Aaliyah's transformation." Raph interjected quickly.

"No one was saying that she did Raph." Leo interrupted sternly.

"I was making sure that no one tried to cross that bridge Leo." Raph replied hotly.

"No one seemed to know that bridge was there until you pointed it out." Leo shot back. Aaliyah put a hand on his arm.

"You know as well as I do that that is the first logical step one would take when someone reveals their connection to an enemy." Raph snapped as Jennifer took his hand to try to calm him.

"Like you did with Karai?" Leo questioned angrily.

Splinter slammed his cane down on the ground hard. "That is enough! Both of you!" The rat master exclaimed so loudly that everyone jumped slightly. "Raphael, no one said that Jennifer was to blame for what happened to Aaliyah, most of all her sister. Leonardo, one cannot deny that that is a likely conclusion to have been made. Both of you jumped to conclusions that did not need to be made, and in another circumstance that would have caused even more unneeded hostilities."

"I assume that whatever part I may have thought Jennifer played in my sister's transformation, if I had assumed she had a part at all, that any animosity would have been resolved between her and my sister already since they're sitting here comfortably with you guys." Adelita now stated firmly. "So any reaction I could have had isn't appropriate."

Both red masked and blue masked turtle shot each other annoyed looks but considering both their father and Adelita had pretty much shot their reason to argue down they let the matter drop.

"Anyway," Renet tried to move on nervously. "All the info is right there, but Lord Simultaneous isn't really sure where to get more information about those demon things from, but he'll tell me when we can figure out that out."

"Is that even important?" Mikey asked. "I mean, Fulcanelli has…kind of been taken care of."

"Do not underestimate any of our enemies Michelangelo." Splinter advised him. "As we should know they could return at any time."

"My father doesn't control them explicitly." Jennifer added as she brushed a strand of her blonde hair behind her right ear. "Something else controls those demons and merely let my father use them for his own ends."

"In other words they could be back." April translated. "We're all looking forward to that."

Aaliyah leaned over and laid her head on Adelita's shoulder. Despite the fact for the first time in her life she couldn't feel her younger sister's hair on her skin, as she lacked hair as a turtle, it still seemed right. She kissed her lightly on the head. "Our parents are gone. All I have now is you." Adelita said softly and sadly. "You have your friends though, and I hope that, someday, they will be mine too."

"No question about it." Aaliyah promised her older sister. "They will be." Both girls then started to cry again as the realization again came that their parents were gone and that someone out there still wanted them dead. Leo squeezed Aaliyah's free hand comfortingly.

Karai came and sat by Adelita, not feeling comfortable enough to give the same physical comfort that her oldest younger brother did but felt she had to say something. "We all understand how you feel, at least a little." The kunoichi took a deep breath, wanting to get this out. "I've always mourned the mother I never knew, O'Neill's mother is missing and probably gone too, has been for like a decade, Jennifer's mother died about a decade ago as well, and Casey' mom is gone too. We all know how it feels to find ourselves without a parent."

"When I lost my mom, I all but lost my dad too." Jennifer added softly. "Any part of him that was good seemed to have died when my mom got really sick too." She walked over and took Adelita's hand and squeezed it gently. "I've been alone for a long time, not even a sister to lean on. It's hard and it hurts, but we have learned around here that we can all be each other's family."

"I like to think of Jennifer as a sister too." Aaliyah said to Adelita as she tried to wipe away her tears, and not really being that successful. "I hope in time you can see her that way too."

Adelita looked at every one again, mutant, human and former humans now mutants, and how they didn't seem to care about the difference. She thought she could see herself thinking the same way. "I would like that, very much." Adelita said as she squeezed Jennifer's hand softly and laid her head against Aaliyah's.

Raph sighed. "You're right Leo; I jumped the gun on that." He admitted grudgingly.

"It's alright." Leo told his younger brother. "I should have understood where you were coming from. Especially since we were talking about something that at one point you were fighting vehemently against, and now you have the wisdom to know better. I should have too."

Both brothers fist bumped, their way of saying all was forgiven. Aaliyah and Adelita smiled a little at that despite their tears. They had had their share of arguments and their share of forgiveness, at least before they had drifted because of their interests.

"We have a few hours before sun down and patrol." Donnie said. "I want to get started at looking at the information Renet brought back." He looked to April. "Want to help?"

April nodded. "Sure."

"You have fun with that." Raph called out to them as Mikey turned on Crognard the Barbarian. Each of them was a bit surprised to learn during commercial though that Nightwatcher had made a late day move to stop a carjacking, making Raph comment, "This guy's getting bolder I see."

Splinter hoped this vigilante knew what they were doing, especially with more than humans out there causing trouble. "I believe the time is nearing for us to find this person and convince them to cease their vigilantism." He looked to Casey and Raph. "Nonviolently, since they have not proven to be a threat to us." Casey snapped his fingers in regret as Karai rolled her eyes at the gesture.

"We'll try to do that tonight while on patrol then." Leo decided.

"Do you patrol too Aaliyah?" Adelita asked younger sister.

"Most of the time." She answered. "I can stay here if you'd like though."

Adelita shook her head. "No, it's okay. Go with the others. I'll have a nice late dinner ready for all of you when you all get back."

"Hey, that's usually my job, or Jennifer's lately." Mikey tried to protest, but the fact that he said so nonchalantly showed he didn't really care.

"Well she needs something to occupy her time for a while." Karai pointed out. "At least until she figures out what she wants to do now."

"I want to." Adelita promised them all. "As a way of saying thank you for taking me and taking care of my sister."

Can April and Casey make things right with Angel? Can they convince Nightwatcher about the true dangers of the city? Can they keep Adelita safe from whoever sent the Thanosoids? And remember reviews are always nice and welcome to get, as are any suggestions The adventure continues.


	47. Nightwatcher

Before patrol April got the chip the alien had given them installed into one of Donnie's computers and then, with some assistance from an online video, created an app that she was able to get installed on the T-phones. It was a simple enough process and she knew Donnie was there to help if she needed it.

The purple masked turtle himself was going through the information that Renet had provided for him on her return from visiting her teacher Lord Simultaneous. He was finding several interesting things for him as he was writing various things in a small notebook he had in hand.

When it came time to go Aaliyah gave Adelita her T-phone for the night in case she needed it. Donnie promised to make one for the turtle girl's older sister when they came back from patrol but in the meantime Aaliyah was going to stick with the group.

It was decided that except for Renet, Splinter and Adelita the group as a whole would patrol together for several reasons. The first being it was easier to keep an eye out for one of the jewels they were looking for if they were together. The second was the appearance of the Thanosoids who were lethal in number if not in ability. The third was the fact the Kraang were interested in it as well. The last thought was because what would happen if someone else was looking for the eyes of sarnath as well.

After hitting the surface they began their patrol and search for whichever eyes of sarnath they could find.

Meanwhile Adelita started the dinner she wanted to make for her new friends who had also taken such care of her little sister. She often wished their relationship had been better but circumstances had not allowed that to happen and she hoped this would soon change. She found though she was lacking some ingredients for the spaghetti she wanted to make. "Sometimes art and food prep are so similar it's funny." She mused.

She knew Splinter was meditating in his room and she wasn't quite sure where Renet had gone too, so she left the lair and went to the surface. She had overheard from Karai and Casey were a local grocery store was and went in to get what she needed. She hoped to get to the lair just as easily.

"I have just heard from the others, master." Tiger Claw said as he bowed before Shredder, who sat on his throne. "They were apparently sent halfway across the US, well into Oklahoma. They will return to here in less than two hours, they have just entered the city."

"How did that happen?" Shredder demanded.

"Steranko said it was a combination of that garbage monster they ran into previously and some power from the girl who saved our enemies from the attack on the rooftop after the defeat of Fulcanelli and the Golden's." Tiger Claw explained.

The Kraang droid head suddenly activated and on screen appeared none other than Kraang Prime. "One called Shredder." He said.

Shredder glared at the image of the Kraang leader. Though they were tenuous allies it wasn't exactly an ironclad one. "What do you want?" He asked.

"Your assistance in acquiring several jewels known as the eyes of sarnath." Kraang Prime answered bluntly. "With that we can take back the city known as New York City."

"Very well." Shredder agreed, though in truth he planned on acquiring these jewels without the Kraang knowing about them and using whatever powers they possessed to destroy them, Hamato Yoshi and all of his allies. "It shall be done." He turned to Tiger Claw. "Get in contact with Bradford and the others and tell them they have a mission."

"Who has this eye of sarnath thing anyway?" Mikey asked as he looked over Donnie's shoulders. Since they had first detected the first piece it seemed to be moving randomly around the city.

"Maybe it's on stray or wild animal." Jennifer suggested.

"We should bring it home." Raph said jokingly. "We seem to be finding all the strays anyway. I mean; Ice Cream Kitty and Bigfoot for starters."

"Bigfoot?" Aaliyah asked curiously.

"I'll tell you about it over dinner tonight," April promised.

"Let's get going." Leo said. "We need to find this before someone else does." The continued going along the rooftops. Again the long trained ninjas and kunoichi's were very surprised at how well Jennifer was keeping up.

They seemed to be gradually getting closer though the signal took several different turns that they had to adjust to keep up with. It seemed random to all of them but since they didn't know who or what their target was is was hard to tell.

They kept going at full speed and were not at all prepared for the massive lizard like creature that slammed right into the four turtle brothers. They fell back hard and immediately had Aaliyah and their three human allies by their side. The lizard creature shifted into Hector. And joining him on the roof were the other Foot mutants; Rahzar, Fishface, Rocksteady, Bebop, Groundchuck and Dirtbag.

"We meet again." Rahzar growled.

"You look well rested." Mikey tried to joke. "Did you guys have a nice vacation."

"Vacation?" Bebop questioned. "It wasn't no vacation you freak. You all are going to pay for that little trip." With that he twisted his hips and the lasers started to fly.

Adelita started out of the store and only walked a little before two of the Thanosoids landed in front of her. Before she could make it backwards more than two steps she heard two more land behind her.

"You will be coming with us." One of them said as it reached for Adelita's arm. The girl dodged to the side and started to run, not aware she was going in the opposite direction of where she needed to go.

The Thanosoids were easily pursuing her. She reached for her sister's T-phone but one of the robots pulled out laser gun and tried to shoot her. She barely dodged the beam but it took out the T-phone. "Damn it." She cursed softly as she tried to pick up her pace. She intended to turn another corner but a speeding car barreled right toward her and with a shriek she barely avoided it by running into an alley, cornering her.

She turned to see the four Thanosoids now standing in the mouth of the alley.

Everyone dodged out of the way of the lasers as they drew their weapons and prepared to fight.

"You know, one would think you two would love to get out of the city." Karai remarked to Bebop and Rocksteady. "Isn't that why you two morons kidnapped me and took me back to the Shredder?"

"That was before we became freaked out." Bebop snapped.

"That plan went down the drain long ago." Rocksteady agreed as he tried to punch Karai right in the face, but the lithe kunoichi dodged out of the way and the rhino accidently clocked his warthog partner.

"Watch it big S." Bebop commented as he started to get up.

Groundchuck charged right at Michelangelo and the orange turtle jumped over him as he deadpanned, "Man, you're charging the wrong turtle. I'm wearing orange not red."

"Maybe he's color blind." Donnie suggested as he blocked the butterfly knife attack that Fishface launched at him and then slapped him with his bo staff.

Rahzar snapped at Leo and the blue masked turtle dodged it. He tried to slash at him with his claws but he blocked it with his katana's.

The chameleon like mutant summoned a bunch of Dark Oni and they immediately made directly for Aaliyah, April and Casey. "Let's see if I can make you take another tumble off the roof." Hector said to Raphael gleefully as he formed his seemingly ever present mantis scythe's in place of his hands. "Then when that happens I can celebrate with a reunion with my blonde beauty."

Raph let out a growl. "She isn't your anything and the only one taking another tumble off a roof is you." Raph snapped. "And this time you won't have the consciousness to make wings to get out." With that he jumped right at the mutant and started to clash scythe to sai with the mutant that was quickly becoming his arch nemesis.

Jennifer tried to help Raph out but he only laughed at her. "You hold no surprises for me little girl, though you hold other things I do like." With that he delivered a brutal snap kick right into her chest and she let out a shout of pain as she fell back.

'You son of…" Raph started before he punched Hector right in the face and then delivered a hard kick to his stomach. Only his shifting into a slug allowed the shifter to dodge a blow to the back of the head.

Casey, April and Aaliyah were holding off the Dark Oni decently well. "We've got these demon minions." Casey said to the red headed girl who used to be his crush. "Go and make sure Jennifer is okay."

"Alright." April agreed and after using one of her tessen to slash one of the Dark Oni into shadows again ran off to check on her blonde friend. She knelt down beside her. "Are you alright?" She asked her.

Jennifer managed to get out a nod. "Yes." She answered. She was trying to catch her breath but nothing had been broken. "It wasn't so much the actual hit; it was more…where he hit." She said softly. "It's not the first one."

"Raph is going to beat him again, I promise." April said to her.

Hector tried to bring his fists down on Raph but the red masked turtle dodged out of the way. He then delivered a kick to his jaw.

"We need to get rid of these guys or something." Donnie called out as he tried to trip Fishface. While it was seemingly successful the mechanical legs allowed him a very quick recovery. "We're going to lose track of that thing soon enough."

"You think that's their plan?" Mikey questioned as Groundchuck tried to gore him. The orange masked turtle jumped over it and turned it into the kusarigama chain and used it to enrapture the bull mutants legs, making him fall flat on his face. "To make us lose the satellite thing?"

"Sarnath." Aaliyah corrected the youngest turtle as she used her bunrei's to cut through the Dark Oni that were approaching her from all sides. "I could almost see it, if they even knew what the darn thing was or what it even looked like."

Karai jumped over Rocksteady again and then kicked him in the back, making him crash land hard but then had to face Bebop. "How did you even find us in the first place?" She wondered.

"Finding you fools was luck." Bebop admitted even as he powered up his weird laser Mohawk and aimed it at the kunoichi. "But we were told to make sure you didn't get your hands on that object that was mentioned."

"Interesting." Karai noted as she dodged the strike at the last moment and kicked Bebop squarely in the chest. "Wonder if the Kraang went to Shredder for help or if he got in contact with them for whatever reason."

Raph dodged another strike from Hector and then slashed him across the chest with his face, drawing some blood from his cheek. "It had to be the Kraang from the beating we gave them in Central Park." He noted. "How else would he even have found out about it?"

"Would you stop talking while we're fighting?" Rahzar demanded as he swiped at the blue masked turtle again, who blocked with both of his katana blades. "It's very distracting and even a little rude while we're trying to tear you to shreds."

"Sometimes the best thoughts come this way." Leo tried to defend uselessly as he then kicked Rahzar in the chest hard, which drew a yipping sound from him.

"Besides, you're not that big of a threat anyway." Casey noted as he slapped two of the Dark Oni across the face with his enchanted metal baseball bat hard enough to make them dissipate. Either that or it was because of the magic imbued in it, the vigilante didn't really care why it worked just that it did.

Rahzar growled irritably as he tried to rise only for Leo to slam his head into the back of the wolf mutant's head and knocked him out. "Donnie's right though, we've got to wrap this fight up before we lose that piece of the eye of sarnath." He declared. "Let's finish this." He was torn on who he should help but quickly decided it should be Raph as he remembered all too uncomfortably well how Hector had very nearly killed him.

"Sounds like a plan bro." Mikey agreed as he landed a few paces in front of Groundchuck and then slowly started to back up. "Alright, Groundchuck. You want to gore me; you're going to have to put all your effort into it. Show everyone why a mattress should fear the bull."

"I think you mean a matador." Donnie corrected his youngest brother as he blocked Fishface's butterfly knives and managed to disarm the fish mutant of those weapons. He then tried to snap at the purple masked turtle and he jumped back with a yelp.

"Aren't those a brand of tortilla chips?" Mikey asked. He had gotten distracted to the point he had almost forgotten was he was trying to do. The pounding of hooves reminded him what he was planning and barely dodged the oncoming charge from Groundchuck. Donnie dodged it himself and he head butted Fishface. That knocked out the fish mutant and the flying metal legs stuck the bull mutant in the head, resulting in double KO.

"High three!" Mikey exclaimed and Donnie obliged his orange masked brother before turning to go and help Karai.

"We don't have time for this." Karai decided and dodged over Rocksteady. She ran toward her youngest brothers. "Time to backtrack to Raph and Leo." She declared, and the two turtles followed her, the purple masked one a bit more reluctantly.

Jennifer and April started toward Casey and Aaliyah and the white masked turtle had an idea of what the kunoichi was thinking and she indicated that her human companions should start over toward Hector as well, though she noticed the blonde did her best to be as far away as possible and still be ready for whatever the plan was.

"Get back here." Bebop demanded as and Rocksteady started toward the retreating forms with Dirtbag not too far behind him.

Raph was focused on Hector, as was the shape shifting mutant. He found it hard though to ignore the fact that Leo was now in the fight and he found himself in a two on one situation with his mantis like scythes. Then he noticed the other turtles, the girl and the three humans coming toward him. "Running out of courage?" He taunted Raph.

"I'll show you who's running out of what." Raph snapped at him.

"Raph, we have to go now or we might lose the eye of sarnath piece." Jennifer said to him.

Anyone else probably would have gotten a harsh response from the red masked turtle but for reasons even known to him the lithe blonde could always seem to penetrate whatever stubborn and determined haze he could find himself under. "How do we do that?" He asked.

"Time for a vanishing act." Karai answered as they came over. "Let's show them what happens after you've messed with fire and gotten burned."

Mikey looked confused, naturally. "You get an icepack from Ice Cream Kitty." He guessed.

Leo, Raph, Donnie and Aaliyah caught on. "Nope, you're left in the smoke." Leo answered and all four turtles as well as Karai dropped several smoke bombs that left a massive black haze that even the Dark Oni hadn't been able to really see through. When Hector used bat wings to clear the haze their enemies had gone.

Adelita reached for a trashcan lid and tossed it at the lead Thanosoid but a shot of its hand dented the thing nearly in half. "Resistance is futile." He said to their target girl.

From behind them they heard a landing and they turned to see an armored figure right in front of them. The figure rose to their height. "I think you're taking that one from something else, could be copyright infringement." Adelita was sure there was some kind of voice filer being applied and she could not tell anything about her mysterious defender's gender or anything.

It seemed though as if the Thanosoids might have known something. "It is the vigilante that they have called Nightwatcher." The one on the right said. "We can't allow any interference." With that they tried to attack.

"Get out of here." Adelita called out, not wanting to see someone else harmed by what she saw as her stupidity, even if she didn't know this mystery person.

"I'm not going to be doing that." Nightwatcher replied simply. The first Thanosoid lashed out and the vigilante blocked the attack remarkably well considering the opponent was a robot. Adelita could tell that blocking there attacks had hurt her sister and Jennifer just a bit. Karai's armor, light as it was, had protected her from the backlash of blocking metal attacks with flesh and she could see it was the same with Nightwatcher.

Nightwatcher moved in and brought a knee to the Thanosoids chest, crushing something in the robotic body. The vigilante then brought an elbow down hard on the back of the things head. That seemed to shut it down remarkably well. "You three are going to have to better than that."

"We are going to have to approach this more carefully." Another of the Thanosoids said to the other two. "We cannot underestimate this vigilante."

"Damn straight." Nightwatcher agreed with a joyous laugh. Adelita had to admire her savior's bravery and humor. It was like this was a game and no one's life was in danger.

Now all three of them charged Nightwatcher. The vigilante struck back at all three of them but the hits weren't as effective as they were one on one. Whatever the armor was constructed of it held up remarkably well against the pounding that the three of them were bringing upon it.

Nightwatcher was able to take out another one with a solid punch right through the chest, but something inside scraped the metal glove coming out and it seemed to retract as if the suit of armor realized it was in need of a repair. The bad news was it left the wearer's hand vulnerable. "Damn it." The vigilante cursed.

Then she heard the approaching sound of three more Thanosoids coming down the street. "Our reinforcements have arrived." The initial leader said. "Now you will pay for your interference Nightwatcher."

"No." Adelita said. "Take me and just leave."

"The hell with that." Nightwatcher snapped. "You have to kill me to get to her."

"That can, and will, be arranged." The leader said.

Then Adelita noticed shadows descending from the rooftops and she was afraid that even more Thanosoids had shown up. She wasn't nearly as afraid of being kidnapped and taken to wherever they wanted to take her so much as them killing off this person who so valiantly had tried to defend her.

That lasted right until the blur of a green skinned, shelled warrior with a white bandana brought her bunrei's down on top of the lead Thanosoid's head and through the skull and through the first top of its head.

That was followed by Leo's katana chopping one of the Thanosoid's in half. Donnie brought his bo staff transformed naginata down into another head and then traced it down until it was carved in half. Raph was a bit more literal as he landed hands down with his sais drilling into the Thanosoid's head before tearing the head off of the body. Mikey brought his kusarigama blade into his Thanosoid. Karai finished up the job by landing in front of the last Thanosoid and stabbed it in the head with the tonta and then followed up with a few stabs to the chest, deactivating that one.

April, Casey and Jennifer were now by Adelita's side.

"Are you okay?" Nightwatcher asked Adelita as she started toward them but hesitated.

"I'm fine." Adelita promised.

"Yeah, thanks for that." Aaliyah said to the vigilante.

"I think it's time we have a little chat about the whole vigilante thing though." Raph said. "It's really dangerous and kind of irresponsible."

"Hey, right here." Casey interjected.

"Raph's point has been made." Donnie said jokingly and after receiving a glare from him he moved on, "But the point is still there. It's very dangerous to be doing that. Purple Dragons are one thing but there are worse things, even worse than the Thanosoids which are basically robots."

"Donnie is right." April now said as she came forward to elaborate on her boyfriend's words but stopped as she saw the hand. "Casey. Look." She gasped.

Casey followed her vision and then noticed what April had. What no one but the two of them could have possibly recognized. The two tear drops on the web of her right hand. "No way." He said. Donnie echoed the same thing as he glanced at his T-phone.

"No way what?" Raph asked them slightly annoyed that their train of thought had been derailed.

"The eye of sarnath. It's right here in this alley." Donnie said. He looked to the vigilante. "Nightwatcher has it."

"No." April said, startling her friends except for Casey who knew what she was going to say. "Angel has it."

"Who?" Mikey asked, now looking to see if he was missing some large white feathered wings on the vigilante's back.

The helmet retracted back, exposing the vigilante's head and neck. The turtles saw a Hispanic girl with black hair though she had purple streaks in her hair too. "It had to be that hand." She said slightly annoyed. "But then again I guess I got some answers too."

"Answers?" Leo asked guardedly.

"I think she's talking about us." Casey said. "We kind of…blew her off this morning. She volunteered to come with us." He looked to Aaliyah. "To help you with anything involving your sister. But since your secret wasn't ours to give we couldn't let her."

"To which we feel really guilty about." April said as she looked to their new friend. "We really are sorry about that."

"Again, I think I got those answers." Angel said as she looked at the five mutant turtles. "I can see why you weren't so sure about saying anything."

"Yeah, well if you'll just be kind enough to give us that little jewel thing you go there we'll be on our way." Raph commented.

"Raph." Jennifer interjected. "We can't just take it. She found it first and she doesn't seem to be doing anything wrong with it." She placed her hand gently on Adelita's shoulder. "In fact she helped a friend when the rest of us couldn't." Again the red masked turtle looked slightly annoyed but couldn't argue with the logic or the girlfriend.

"Did you make that?" Donnie asked Angel.

"Found it." The girl corrected.

"Adelita, what were you doing out here on your own anyway?" Aaliyah asked her older sister. "You know it wasn't safe."

"I needed something for dinner." Adelita told her younger sister. "I thought I could get there in back before something happened." She sighed softly. "I guess I was wrong."

"We've all made mistakes." Leo assured her. "Come on; let's get back to the lair where it's safe."

"And you can finish dinner." Mikey added before getting slapped in the back of the head by Raph.

Adelita nodded a bit but then said, "I would like Angel to come back with us." She said. "I want to thank her for helping me out. And it seems like she might be tied in with what's going on here."

"I wouldn't mind getting a look at that armor or that piece of the eye of sarnath." Donnie agreed. "It might help us figure out where the next one is and see what the next step is after we acquire it all."

"On top of that, if we know Angel has it then that means sooner or later the Kraang and the Foot clan will too." Aaliyah added. "That makes her a target and she needs to know what she's getting into."

Each of the brother's already knew that Splinter would not be happy about this. Each of them also knew Aaliyah spoke the truth about her situation, as did Adelita. For good or bad it seemed as if Angel was now embroiled into this problem too.

"Let's get back to the lair then." Leo said. He looked to Angel. "I should warn you our master Is a giant rat." He looked to Casey. "I know someone who found that hard to deal with for a while there."

"Ah, shove it Leo." Casey replied with a laugh.

"No problems here." Angel said. "Always knew New York was a bizarre place."

Is there anything Donnie can learn from the Nightwatcher armor? Will finding the first eye lead to the second? How much trouble are the team in with Shredder's mutant army back in town? The adventure continues.


	48. Captured part 1

They returned to the lair with Angel in tow. The first thing they were greeted with as a frantic Renet. "Oh my gosh." She said as she ran over to meet her friends. "I was so scared when I found Adelita not here in the lair."

"Where'd you go anyway?" Raph asked the apprentice time mistress.

"I had to go back and see if I could find something." Renet answered. "I was hoping it would help us figure out the Thanosoid thing but it was a dead end." She did not seem at all surprised to see Angel but they were used to it by now. They assumed the girl knew most everything that could happen by now.

Next Leo went had to explain to Master Splinter why one, or in this case all of them, had again brought a stranger into their home. His demeanor softened a bit when told Angel had done her best to protect Adelita and then became understanding when Leo explained her armor had a piece of the eye of sarnath in it and on top of it had the armor in the first place, which she was using to be the vigilante Nightwatcher.

"It is better that she have some association with us rather than not if she is this Nightwatcher and has something to do with these eyes of sarnath." The rat master conceded.

"Where'd you find that anyway?" Casey asked her.

"Found it on the roof of my apartment building." Angel answered as she glanced around the lair. She had to swerve a bit to avoid Raph's stack of martial arts magazines. "I couldn't figure out where it came from, but this is the original form." She rubbed her right wrist and all of the armor retracted into the form of a small metallic bracelet. "Figured someone lost it, kept it in case someone came back for it and never did."

"Do you think that's the armor that alien was about to mention in Central Park?" April speculated.

"It might be." Donnie agreed. "It might have been lost by someone else of his race before our friend crashed his ship into the Central Park lake." He looked to Angel. "Would it be alright if I examine it for a little bit?"

Angel hesitated just a second before pulling the bracelet off of her wrist. "Alright." She conceded and tossed it to the purple masked turtle. "But I'm not leaving this place until I get it back." She warned.

"Fair enough." Donnie agreed as he headed toward the lab, April choosing to follow her boyfriend and help in whatever way she could.

"You're not leaving until after dinner anyway." Adelita reminded her as she headed toward the kitchen. "I promised you a thank you dinner."

"I'll help." Mikey said.

"Not if we want to actually eat it." Raph said as he grabbed the back of Mikey's belt and made him sit down. "If she needs help she'd be better off asking Jennifer."

"I can help if you want." Jennifer offered.

"Thanks, but I got it." Adelita said and went into the kitchen. With a shrug Jennifer sat by her red masked boyfriend and leaned her head against his shoulder.

Mikey turned on a Super Mecha Robo Force Five episode and soon everyone was engrossed in the episode except for of course Donnie and April in the lab, Adelita in the kitchen, and Splinter and Karai who had retreated to the dojo for some father/daughter bonding.

An hour later Adelita called dinner was ready but they quickly realized they didn't have a big enough table for them all to eat at and they had to take their spaghetti to the living room to eat. Aaliyah smiled. "I'd forgotten about this." She said whimsically.

"Forgot about what?" Leo asked her.

"When we were younger and we were having frequent family meals Adelita would do this." The female turtle explained to them all. "We called it Adelita's spaghetti night. She'd commandeer the kitchen to make dinner and you weren't allowed in unless she let you come in."

"At least it smells better than when Mikey makes food." Raph granted.

"It does smell really good." Angel agreed as she gave Adelita a small smile.

"I take great offense to that." Mikey told his brother. "Even though this does smell really good."

"You put mushrooms in the spaghetti?" Karai asked surprised.

Adelita nodded. "Yes. Fresh is the best but I had to go with canned considering how late it was and all." She answered. "You don't like mushrooms?"

"No, I'm fine with them." The kunoichi answered. "It's just eating was more about necessity than taste." She shrugged. "When you're Shredder and running the foot you have more 'important' things to worry about the gourmet meals."

"Dude, that is so sad." Mikey noted, earning eye rolls from his brothers.

"I liked to do that too." Jennifer noted. "Sometimes I would cook some hamburger and use it with the spaghetti too."

"We did Italian sausages sometimes." Aaliyah replied. "At least when we thought about it."

It seemed to be a unanimous decision that Adelita's spaghetti was good. Jennifer and Adelita started to talk about collaborating on making a meal for them all sometime soon. Mikey of course wanted to help out, to which the blonde was more than willing to let him but already knew she had to make sure he didn't do something…well as Raph had called it, Mikeyish.

They were almost through dinner, except Mikey who was going for his fourth helping, when Donnie's T-phone went off. It was confusing for a moment seeing as how everyone was here except for the Mutanimals until he checked it out. "Awesome." Donnie commented.

"What, you won some kind of nerd prize?" Raph asked with a small laugh.

"No shell brain." Donnie answered with a small glare. "Thanks to Angel's Nightwatcher armor and the first eye of sarnath piece the tracking app has already located the second fragment."

"What I do?" Angel asked a little confused.

"Some part of your armor has a homing device for the fragments built into it." Donnie explained to her as he stood up to go to the lab. "Combined with an actual example of the energy contained in the eye of sarnath April and I were able to pull a major update on the original tracking information we got in Central Park."

"So where is the second piece located Donnie?" Leo asked his smartest brother.

"Looks like it crashed in the warehouse district." Donnie said after he lifted up the screen of the laptop he had.

"This seems kind of wrong somehow." April said. "I mean we haven't had very much luck in that area as of late."

Everyone except Angel could recall on some level the place in the district where they had the final confrontation of the gang war between themselves, The Golden's, Fulcanelli's syndicate and the Foot clan. Only the Foot and they had walked away from that one. Also of note was the Kraang lab that had been there that had been taken over by April's 'sister' May when she wanted to use the red head's powers to her own advantage, and that one only failed because of Jennifer accidently tapping into her undiscovered powers.

Donnie handed Angel the bracelet back, which she reaffixed to her wrist. It was odd that she hadn't had it that long and yet the young Latina had felt kind of naked without it. "I don't know what you mean exactly." Angel commented. "But if that is there we can't just ignore it."

"Angel is correct." Splinter agreed. "We cannot."

"So let's get a move on then." Raph said.

"Hold up." Leo said. "I have to agree with April. Angel is right that we can't just ignore this possibility but we can't all go charging in either."

"So what do you want to do Fearless?" Raph asked Leo as he crossed his arms over his chest almost defiantly.

"We split into two teams, one a strike team and the other the backup in case something goes wrong." Leo said. "The five of us turtles and Karai will be the strike team. We need to get in, find the fragment piece and get out."

"And we're supposed to sit around like some stupid sidekicks?" Angel asked indignantly. It amazed Splinter how in some ways she exhibited so many of both April and Casey's less than endearing traits, though they were none the less useful ones.

"Yeah, maybe." Raph said to her as he looked at her.

"Only if we're lucky." Leo told her. "Odds are we may not be. If that's the case then you will be leading Jennifer, April, and Casey to back us up."

"I should go with the strike team." Renet announced.

"You?" Angel questioned. She didn't know what the apprentice time mistress was capable of. Of course Raph did but he had his own doubts.

"That might be a good idea." Donnie vouched. "If April's intuition is right about this we might need a quick getaway, and what's faster than Renet opening up a doorway for us."

"That would also be a good reason to have someone here waiting." Splinter added. "In case something tries to follow you through the doorway it will be helpful to have fresh allies waiting to stop them."

"If you needed to could you open a doorway for us to come to you right away?" April asked Renet.

The apprentice time mistress shrugged. "I don't know April, I've never tried." She answered simply.

"Aaliyah, Renet, my sons, my daughter, go and retrieve the second fragment." Splinter ordered them. He looked to the four humans. "Be prepared to back them up if need be." He knew none of them were happy but he at least knew what to say to Angel, who was seemed to be the most disgruntled about this. "Remember that this is a double edged sword. If the Shredder or the Kraang know anything about this then you are just as valuable a target as the fragment is and you might be in more danger by going on this mission unless you have too."

Angel sighed a bit but nodded. "Yeah, I guess you've got a point there." She conceded. "But it if comes to it that won't stop me from helping."

"Nor would I expect it to." Splinter replied.

"Be careful Aaliyah." Adelita said to her little sister. She wasn't sure how long it would take her to get used to her going out to do this, if she ever got used to it at all. "I just got you back, I don't want to lose you again."

"Not going to happen." Aaliyah promised her older sister. "I just got you back to and I don't want that to end so soon." With that she, Karai, Renet and the four turtle brothers left the lair.

"They'll be fine." Angel tried to assure Adelita as she placed a hand gently on her shoulder. "They'll make it back safe and sound and we can figure out what's for dessert."

"Does Adelita always worry like that?" Raph asked Aaliyah as they ran the roof tops to get to their destination. Mikey carried Renet on his back and none of them were too upset about that position as far as anyone could tell.

"It's gotten more obvious since our parents…" Aaliyah started but let that thought go. They had a mission to complete and she couldn't stop to think too much about her parent's murder right now. In truth she knew she had to take the time to mourn properly but right now she had to keep busy. "But she's always been concerned about me, even when we drifted so far apart."

"You two sure don't act like you drifted." Mikey said.

"Wait and see if you say that two weeks from now." Aaliyah noted, only half-jokingly. "After we've gotten used to each other again."

"I know all about overbearing older siblings." Raph said with a glance at Leo and small grin.

"I know all about impulsive and stubborn younger siblings." Leo shot back with his own grin.

"At least you don't have brothers." Karai said to Aaliyah as she jumped over a satellite dish to avoid crushing it. "They're more annoying than sisters."

"What would you know about siblings, brother or sister?" Raph questioned Karai as they continued along. The tone of his voice was light suggesting that he was half joking with her but he was curious. She had been part of their family for only a few weeks and had not had siblings of her own as Shredder's daughter, thankfully.

"I know who's got the loudest mouths on an average day." Karai replied. "And it's usually your or Mikey."

"Awesome." Mikey noted.

"Not sure that was a compliment Mikey." Donnie told him.

"I know Adelita means well, just as you know Leo means well." Aaliyah said to Raph as she forced the ends of her white mask away from her eyes. "I also know why sometimes it seems all the more important to prove them wrong."

They made the jump into the warehouse district and Donnie started to direct them toward the location. "It looks to be in the subway area that connects the city together." The purple masked turtle noted. "Though it seems as if this particular one has been abandoned."

"An abandoned subway area in the middle of the largely abandoned warehouse district?" Raph questioned and looked to Leo. "I'm really starting to think April was right about this."

"Yeah, me too Leo." Mikey added as he cast a surreptitious backwards glance at the collapsed building that had been the Kraang lab May had taken over.

"It doesn't change the fact that we don't have a choice about this." Karai reminded her two younger brothers. "We have to get this fragment before the Kraang or Shredder does."

The six ninjas leapt off the roof top. Mikey let Renet down off of his back and then they drew their weapons as they slowly started down the steps to the subway station. All conversation ceased as they went downwards. They could all feel as if something wasn't right.

When they reached the bottom they found the place seemed almost too neat, as if someone were coming out and cleaning the area, and it seemed to be something that happened at least once a day. It raised the hairs on the back of Karai's neck and knew the turtle's would feel the same way despite the lack of hair on their skin. Though Aaliyah had been human enough to remember that feeling.

"Donnie?" Leo whispered. "Where is it?"

Donnie motioned them to move further into the area. "It should be here somewhere. Looks like not too far from here." He answered as they turned around a corner.

"I don't like this." Raph hissed quietly. "This is getting worse all of the time."

They soon came to a four way corridor, which was odd to Leo as most subway stations didn't have something like this. "I think it's time to turn back." Leo whispered to them all. "We can figure this out later, after we get access to this place's layout."

They were all about to agree when the lights suddenly flashed on all around them and parts of the walls seemed to lift up as dozens of men on each side emerged with their guns raised and pointed at them all.

"Make one move and my men will poke you full of holes." Said a voice from down the corridor. They all turned to see a tall and gaunt looking man wearing a business suit and wearing a pair of sunglasses. "I'm confident that these bullets will even take out mutant turtles and a mutant snake girl."

"Who the hell are you?" Raph demanded to know.

The man ignored him. "Drop your weapons and raise your hands. Now." He ordered.

Leo knew his sister, brothers and Aaliyah were looking at him for guidance. He wasn't too sure what to do here either though. "Who are you? What do you want?" He repeated his red masked brother's question.

"It should be obvious what I want." The man said simply. "I'm going to dissect each of you to see what makes you tick so I can figure out how to deal with your kind."

"I'd rather miss that." Karai replied.

"Renet, I think we'd better get out of here." Leo said.

Renet was very nervous, being surrounded by so many guns. She knew even an apprentice time mistress could be killed by those things. She only hoped they wouldn't see her raising her arm with the scepter in it as an aggressive move. Leo even tried to support that by ordering his team to, "Do as he says and drop your weapons."

The turtles and Karai each reluctantly did as he ordered but somehow the man must have known what was going on, as they each dropped their weapons but Renet was slow with the time scepter to open the door he nodded to two of his men who shot Renet in her arm right arm and in her stomach.

Mikey gasped out, "Renet! NO!"

"You son of a bitch!" Raph growled and started to reach for his sais. That was when the other men shot at the turtles and Karai. Unlike the bullets Renet took these weren't real bullets rather tranquilizers and shock prods. Even as they were injected with the tranquilizers they also had their systems overloaded just to make sure they couldn't fight back.

Once that was done the man ordered. "Pack up the turtles and the snake girl. We need them bound before they wake up."

One of the men looked to him. "What about the girl?" He asked.

He looked down at Renet and then shrugged. "She's not the girl I'm interested in. Let her die." He then turned his back on his subordinates as they collected the five turtles and Karai. One of the guys gave Renet a look that she remembered she had gotten from the host at Cowabunga Carl's that Mikey had not seemed to appreciate before he walked away as well.

Renet found it hard to collect their weapons and her time scepter. She then took a deep breath. "Why does getting shot hurt so much?" She asked herself and then flinched. As far as she thought it seemed as if the bullets had gone through her arm and her stomach and out cleanly on the other side. The bad news was unless Jennifer could heal her, she wasn't sure she'd be alive to see Mikey and the others again. With that she concentrated as hard as she could to open up a doorway back to the lair before she lost the fight for her life.

"How much longer could this possibly take?" Angel asked in frustration as she paced the lair. She saw Jennifer fidgeting nervously as well. Casey and April seemed to be a bit calmer as they had been at this longer, but Angel suspected even then it wasn't quiet that easy.

"We have to be patient." Adelita said. "I know it's not easy, my sister is part of that team after all." She took a deep breath. "But we already know there has to be some kind of complications."

"I should have gone with them." Angel sighed annoyed. She hated being on the sidelines even if there was a chance she could have been a target. She sat down by Adelita and laid her head against the couch. "I hate feeling so useless."

"You are not useless." Splinter said to Angel. "None of you are. You must just remain patient."

"For what it's worth, even if somehow this turns out fine and we don't get in on the action, we'll have plenty of other chances." Jennifer promised her.

"I'd still rather get in right now." Angel admitted.

Casey nodded appreciatively. "I hear that. I hate this sidelining stuff." He agreed. "I'd rather be on the battlefield any day of the week."

April and Jennifer exchanged glances. Both of them had come to the point they had no problem contributing in a fight but they certainly didn't feel the need to go out of the way for it either.

April felt something strange and she looked up just in enough time to see a doorway open close to the ceiling, and out fell Renet along with the weapons belonging to Donnie, Leo, Raph, Mikey, Aaliyah and Karai. The door closed behind them.

"Renet!" Jennifer gasped as she ran over to the apprentice time mistress. She knelt beside her and noticed the bullet wounds in her arm and stomach.

Angel was next and knelt down as well. She took a quick look at the wounds. "The bullets passed through cleanly." She revealed. "But short of a miracle there's no way she'll survive this."

"Time to get to work miracle girl." Casey said to Jennifer.

Jennifer nodded and placed her hands just above both of the bullet wounds. It didn't take much focus between her training and her concern for Renet for the blue tingle to spread over her hands and over Renet's wounds. In about a minute she was fully healed, at least physically.

"Wow." Angel got out, stunned. "That was…cool."

"Are you okay?" April asked Jennifer. She knew sometimes using her powers like that could drain her.

The blonde nodded. "Yeah, I think so."

Renet opened her eyes, still feeling worn out. "The guys, Karai, Aaliyah." She said softly.

"What happened to them? To my sister?" Adelita asked worriedly.

"Taken…by the Earth Defense Force…" Renet tried to get out and then fell unconscious again.

The horned man answered the communication instantly. "Report." He ordered.

"They fell for the trap, the fragment of the eye of sarnath that we found was the perfect bait, and now we have the five mutant turtles and the snake girl." The man reported to his superior. "They were the only ones aside from some other girl. The one I wanted is not here."

"Patience." The horned man told him. He suspected the other girl must have been the apprentice time mistress. The time scepter would have been a great boon to his plans but he had made them without that artifact and in the end was irrelevant. "They'll come to rescue the turtles and their sister. I'd take this opportunity to learn what you can in the meantime. Then when the girl shows up get your scans of her so you can proceed to the next step." He leaned back a bit in his chair though the horns were still visible. "Don't worry Agent Bishop. This will start you on the path to the journey you're seeking."

"I certainly hope so." Bishop said to his employer as he leaned back in his chair.

What angle does Bishop have in mind? Who is the mystery employer? How will Angel, April, Jennifer and Casey rescue their friends from the Earth Defense Force? The adventure continues.


	49. Captured part 2

Angel had paced impatient and worried for an hour before Renet regained consciousness. "It was a trap." Renet reiterated. "We were set up by the EPF, EDF, whatever they call themselves." She took a deep breath. "I tried to open up a doorway to get us back here but one of them shot me with bullets."

"Yeah, we remember that." Angel replied as she glanced at the apprentice time mistress's arm. "Glad you had Jennifer to heal that for you." She had not known anyone long enough to tell them that she too had taken a bullet before as well.

"So did they shoot Raph and everyone else too?" Jennifer asked her worriedly.

"Not with bullets." Renet assured her. "They were shot with these darts and these other things. I don't know how to describe them but they resulted in them getting shocked."

Splinter sighed softly as he buried his fear for Aaliyah and his children. "Tranquilizer darts and stun guns, from the sounds of it." He answered.

"Do you think they're going to experiment on them?" Casey asked, sounding too glib about for any of the girl's personal tastes.

"Casey." Angel said warningly.

"Hey." He looked to the armor wearing vigilante. "It's a chance we have to face, and it's not one I like. Karai is my girlfriend too after all." He glanced at Adelita who had remained silent since this started and then to Angel. "The only one here with nothing to lose really is you."

"Enough." April said as she glared at both of them. "This isn't the time." She stood up and looked over at the Shellraiser. "We have to go rescue them." She declared.

"How are you going to do that?" Adelita asked her softly. She already knew she didn't have what it took to help them rescue her sister and her friends. "They took down five mutant turtles, including my sister and a mutant snake girl." She looked at each of them sadly. "No offense, but how are four humans going to go against a government agency?"

"Five." Renet corrected. "I don't care if I got hurt, I'm fine now and I'm going to go with."

"I am afraid she has a point." Splinter reluctantly conceded as he walked around the living room, trying to hide how deftly afraid he was for his children and Aaliyah. "Even if I were to go with you the odds would be against us."

"But we know what to expect." Angel protested. "We know it's not an ordinary subway station and that they have a bunch of soldiers and stuff."

"You, Renet and Casey are not ninja." Splinter reminded their newest friend. "The odds of you being able to properly get around undetected is slim. Even April and Jennifer, while very advanced for their limited training time, may not be able to do so. Only I would have the best chance of going about undetected."

"Then we don't go undetected." Angel said. "We go in, kick some major butt, rescue your children and Aaliyah, and then get out."

"It sounds dangerous." Adelita said softly. "I want them out just as badly. But if you guys get hurt who's going to help you heal up like Jennifer helped Renet?"

"They won't have us cornered." April agreed. "Like they did with Donnie and everyone else." She was pacing as she was thinking. "I've gotten a look at the information that Donnie has on the Nightwatcher armor. It can withstand bullets and the like. The biggest problem might be the stun guns, but I think Jennifer and I can use our psychic powers to deflect that."

"But those damn numbers." Adelita said. "How do you beat that?"

"We can't." April admitted bluntly. "But we have to try." She nodded to the Party Wagon. "And at least we can have some other reinforcements."

The five human fighters got up and headed toward the Party Wagon. "Please be careful, I want my sister back but not at the expense of you guys as well." Adelita said. Angel reached over and gently took her hand, squeezing it reassuringly a moment. Splinter watched them go, wishing them luck.

Then Jennifer stopped. "Guys, we can't completely negate the numbers advantage. But there is a way to mitigate it a little." She revealed.

Aaliyah moaned a little as she got up. "My head sure is pounding right now." She mused softly. She felt her arms and legs restrained and as she took a breath felt one across her chest as well.

"Join the club." Raph said to her. She looked to the red masked turtle to find him restrained as well. Then as she looked around she saw the same for the other turtles. Not too much further in she saw Karai was in a smaller version of the terrarium she said Shredder had kept her in before the mind control worms took effect.

"Anyone else awake?" Aaliyah asked him.

"Leo's conscious." Raph answered with a very small shrug. "He's trying this whole meditating thing. As far as I can tell Donnie and Mikey are still out. They'd both be going bonkers, though for different reasons."

Aaliyah could see why. They were restrained in a laboratory that was rather heavily advanced and she was sure that Donnie would love to be hypothesizing about it all. Mikey just hated to be quiet any longer than needed. She was sure Raph was only acting so calm because they were alone for the moment and did not want to attract their attention at the moment. "Do you think Renet…" She started.

Raph sighed softly, even a little angrily. "Probably. The arm wound isn't a big deal really but the other went through her stomach." He shook his head. "Who knows how much damage that did, and if they left her there…."

"Poor Mikey." Aaliyah said softly. She found she mourned not only for the young orange masked turtle but for herself as well. She cared for Renet as much as she did any of her family and if she had died…

"Any idea how we get out of here?" Raph asked the female turtle. Aaliyah was kind of glad he interrupted her depressing train of thought.

Aaliyah shook her head. "No idea." She admitted.

The lab doors swooshed open and they saw the sun glassed man walk in with two bald men on either side. The one on the right was clearly a scientist but there was some…air about him that made Aaliyah feel he wasn't some bumbling techy. The one on the other side was dressed in a military uniform. "Ah, at least two of you are awake." The man said.

"Are you finally going to tell us who the hell you are?" Raph growled at him, very annoyed that he had failed twice to answer that question. Of course that was before they were essentially bound.

"I am Agent Bishop." The man introduced. "These are my colleagues Doctor Malcolm and Sergeant Thomas." He indicated the scientist and the marine. "Our employer has hired us for, among other reasons, to determine the origins of your transformation."

Some part of Aaliyah swore this man was lying.

"I examined the blood samples I took from them." Malcom said and Raph glared angrily at the violation, that he had taken blood from each of them while they were unconscious. "They're all natural mutants. The three male turtles are just that, turtles. They must have come in contact with a human shortly before their transformation due to the mutagen."

Raph kept his mouth shut but found it interesting to note this man, who was neither employed by the Foot Clan and didn't seem to be a Kraang in disguise, should know about the mutagen.

He looked to Aaliyah and that was when she saw an even more chilling detail. His right eye was completely milky. It seemed as if he could only see out of one eye though she suspected that wasn't the truth. "The female turtle on the other hand seems to have been a human female for most of her life. There is some…genetic inconsistency in her that is not present in them." He started to walk as he talked. "I suspect her original genetic code was mixed with the genetic code of a turtle. The same species, interestingly enough."

He walked over the terrarium. "As for the snake girl she, like the turtle girl, was human for the majority of her life too. But while each of the turtles have the traces of mutagen in their blood, the snake girl has mutagen as well as another substance."

Aaliyah remembered Donnie speculating that when Stockman had mixed the mutagen that Karai ended up being dunked into there was some sort of experimental retro mutagen in her blood, which is why she could shift between her human form and her snake form at will.

"Great for you milk boy." Raph snapped. "Now let us go."

"On the contrary, I look forward to dissecting all of you when this done." Malcolm said.

"It'll be great for our army." Thomas spoke now.

"So all of these are natural mutants." Bishop mused. "Disappointing."

"What is that supposed to mean?" Raph asked annoyed.

Bishop shrugged. "Your friend, Chein Khan." He said as if they were talking casually over dinner instead of having them strapped down in a lab. "He is…was not."

That caught Aaliyah's curiosity. "What do you mean?" She asked. She wanted to make sure she caught all of this for Donnie and Master Splinter.

"Chein Khan was not a normal mutant." Bishop said as he now walked around the lab, idly examining some of the equipment. "DNA samples show human and canine samples." He looked to both Raph and Aaliyah. "But no trace of mutagen."

"That's impossible." Raph said before he bit his lip, not wanting to give too much information out even if they seemed to know more than even Donnie did in that regard.

"What you, the girl, or your brothers think is irrelevant." Bishop replied dismissively. "Too bad though you didn't bring the one I really needed."

Raph glared at him as two thoughts came to mind; either April or Jennifer. Neither sat well with him at all.

April faced the laptop in front of Renet. She, Jennifer and the apprentice time mistress were in the back. Casey drove and Angel was in the passenger seat. "This is the schematics I found for the area." The red head stated.

Renet blinked in confusion. "This can't be right." She declared. "There is no indication of that four way passage that we got ambushed it."

"Either the schematics are wrong." Casey voiced from the front. "Or someone made some changes to that area that they don't want the public to know about."

"Then we can't go by the schematics." April decided as she closed the laptop and set it aside. "We're going to have to head in there and wing it."

"Don't suppose anything in that fancy armor of yours can help us with that." Casey suggested as he looked over at Angel.

"Not that I know of." She replied.

They stopped just outside of the entrance to the subway tunnel. Casey moved out of the driver's seat and Renet took his place. "Watch for us." April said to the apprentice time mistress. "When we come with the guys be prepared to fire at any pursuers with soda cannons blazing."

Angel snickered just a little. "Do you know how weird that sounds?" She asked with some amusement. She understood how it was supposed to work and admired it but at the same time it was still weird.

April drew her tessen's. Jennifer drew her batons' Casey took out his metal bat. They both then nodded to Angel who twisted the bracelet on her wrist to activate the armor, now basically becoming Nightwatcher to anyone who didn't know her. Then she hesitated. "What about the fragment piece?" She asked them though they could no longer recognize her voice as the synthesizer had been activated with the armor.

"If we find it we grab it." April said. "If we don't we come up with a new plan to get it, after everyone is safe."

Angel nodded. "Sounds good to me." She agreed and then led the way down the flight of subway stairs. She wanted to make sure she took the bullets, confident the armor would stand up to the assault. Casey, Jennifer, and April were right behind her. The instant they got off the staircase they all felt as if something were watching them or something.

As they turned a corner two men turned to see them but before they could do anything Angel delivered an armored fist to both of their chests to knock them out. They were breathing okay so April assume they weren't injured though she wondered how the Latina girl knew how to deliver such precise attacks.

"Hey Red, we don't have a map but do you think you could sense them out?" Casey asked suddenly. That left Angel confused as she hadn't been really briefed on what April could do any more than she had been about Jennifer or Renet.

"I think so." April said. Jennifer moved to stand just behind Angel to act as a second cover while Casey moved in behind April to cover all of them. She then took a deep breath and tried to focus, searching for any signs of her friends and boyfriend. They continued along quietly, not running into any other hostile forces. That worried Angel. "I sense them…in a lab down the corridor on the left and in the far right room." The red head announced.

They started down the corridor and again were surprised by no ambush. Angel had a horrible feeling that for some reason they wanted them to be here but she was hesitant to voice that to the others though she wouldn't be surprise if they felt the same feeling.

They came to the door and Angel was surprised not to see any signs of needing identification. She looked to April. "Is it really that easy?" She asked her dubiously.

April frowned as she took as close of a glance as she dared. "I…It looks like it." She answered softly. "I wish I felt more certain about this, but if the turtles and Karai are in here we don't have a choice." The other three agreed and Angel started toward the door.

Less than a moment later the door opened at her appearance and she was met with the hail of bullets from several men that looked to be special services if Angel was any judge. As it was predicted though the Nightwatcher armor took each of the hits and ricocheted them away from her and protected Casey and the two girls. She saw all five turtles and Karai awake and conscious now.

She moved in and slugged one of them hard in the face. Jennifer and Casey followed with a hit to the other soldier's heads with the their weapons, the blunt end in the blonde's case. April followed last. "Let's get everyone free." The red head declared as she started toward Donnie and his restraints.

"How'd you find us?" Donnie asked as Casey moved to Leo and Jennifer moved to Raph.

"Renet gave us a good idea of where you were." April answered.

"She's alive?" Mikey asked, sounding very relieved.

"She's fine." Angel told him as she worked to free him. "She's waiting in the Party Wagon to get us out of here."

"A date which I'm afraid you won't be making, Nightwatcher." They turned to see Bishop there with several other soldiers again. From the other side others appeared even though there was no door for them to have come through. At another time it would have made April curious.

"Who the hell are you?" Casey asked.

"My name is Bishop." The man said. He looked around at the humans and his eyes came to rest on Jennifer. "Ah, here we go. This is the one I wanted to see."

"Touch her and die scumbag." Raph promised with a glare.

"I'm afraid you won't be around for my plans." Bishop told the red masked turtle. "Now that she's here I will be letting Doctor Malcolm dissect you all for any information he sees fit."

"This isn't over." Angel said with a smirk, though the smirk on her lips was unseen by anyone else.

"I beg to differ." Bishop started to gloat. Then there came two large crashing sounds.

The third exposed it as the wall behind the mysteriously appearing soldiers shattered and they were brushed aside by Leatherhead and Slash with his mace. Right behind them were Pigeon Pete, Rockwell, Mondo Gecko and Candy. "Sorry we're late to the party." Said the skateboarding gecko.

"Better late than never dude." Casey promised as he got to work on Leo's restraints again. "Though I suppose a minute earlier would have been nice too."

Pigeon Pete made an amazing aerial dash at the two soldiers and Bishop before they could try to attack the Mutanimals on the other side. Rockwell started to use his powers to disarm the men as Candy went over to try to free her friend. "Miss me?" She asked.

Aaliyah laughed. "Especially at times like this." She replied.

Leatherhead was able to be a bit more direct as he smashed the terrarium holding Karai in it. The kunoichi nodded appreciatively at the giant mutant gator. "Thanks."

"You are welcome." Leatherhead said in his low gravelly voice.

Karai was slightly dismayed to find that she had no weapons but let that drop. For a ninja didn't need any weapons other than their arms and legs. And she was still a mutant if she needed to use that to her advantage as well.

The other turtles were easily freed now that the guards were distracted by the Mutanimals. Aaliyah and Candy exchanged a brief hug before getting ready for combat.

Leo of course had other ideas. "Time to go." He declared. "We're going to have to worry about what we came for at a later time."

"If they even had it at all." Donnie added, not entirely convinced that they couldn't have found a way to fake the energy signature of the eye of sarnath fragment with what they seemed to have around here.

Slash led the way out. Unlike when Casey and the three human girls had come in now there were plenty of guards in their way but the black masked turtle was able to easily swat their way past them, with the turtles following. Raph, Leatherhead and Angel were bringing up the rear.

April took a moment to text Renet that they were all coming up, including the Mutanimals. Renet texted that they were ready. On the streets was the Shellraiser now, which the Mutanimals had come by the lair to grab so they could get there quicker.

The team ran up the stairs and burst through the subway entrance. Rockwell floated toward the Shellraiser and got ready to use the weapons as well. The Mutanimals made their way into the Shellraiser as the turtles and their companions piled into the Party Wagon. There didn't seem to be any pursuers and they drove off before they could verify if that was luck or not.

Splinter anxiously awaited the return of their human friends along with the rescue of his sons and his daughter, as well as Aaliyah who he knew might as well be his daughter of some sorts as well. It seemed as if it were taking forever.

Adelita sat on the couch and watched the rat master pace. "I'm worried about them too." She confessed.

Splinter looked to her and smiled softly. "I had forgotten that I am not alone." He confessed softly as he sat down next to her on the couch. "I am used to being the only one here when a mission commences."

"Why didn't you go with them?" Adelita asked curiously.

Splinter thought a moment before responding. "I do not know for sure. Certainly in case they fail I can at least attempt to be a last resort. In truth there is also the fact that these kind of things are a young person's game." He looked a bit past her now as he added, "And truth be told I am not a young man anymore."

'You're not verging on death's door either, I don't think anyway." Adelita pointed out.

Splinter chuckled softly. "No, that is true." He agreed. "It is odd though. Fifteen years ago I suspected that my sons and I would live our lives out here in the lair. I never imagined the humans that would be around us that would see beyond our appearances."

"Like me." Adelita said.

"Not just you." Splinter replied. "April, Casey, Jennifer, even my own daughter though she is part mutant now. I suspect if Aaliyah were to ever use the retro mutagen she too would count as well. Even Renet is a surprise despite…or perhaps because of the fact she is from the future." He smiled again. "You know, it is nice to have someone to talk to occasionally while my sons are out on their patrols or their missions. It is a nice stress reliever."

"Well I'll be here." Adelita promised. "I don't think I could do what my sister and your sons do."

They heard the two vehicles pull up and were immediately into Donnie's lab as they saw everyone come out. Karai gasped, "Father." And then ran over to him and gave him a hug. Splinter hugged her back gently.

Now Aaliyah was out and she ran over to hug Adelita. "I'm glad you're okay." Older sister whispered to little sister. "I was so worried."

"Welcome home my sons." Splinter said to his four turtles. "Are you alright?"

"We're just fine master." Leo said. The other three nodded in agreement.

"Did you hear what was said about Chein Khan?" Aaliyah asked Donnie. "He is apparently a mutant not created by mutagen."

"I heard." Donnie said. "I was basically faking the unconscious thing."

"Come again?" April asked. So Aaliyah explained everything they had learned from Bishop as well as their observations about him and his two minions Doctor Malcolm and Sergeant Thomas.

"I don't recall anything about those two from what I remember about the Earth Protection Force." Renet mused. "But that could be another example of this whole time line being messed with thing."

"We need to determine if they truly have a piece to the eye of sarnath, and if so we must figure out how to acquire it." Splinter said. He looked to all of his family from his biological daughter to his adopted sons to the humans they had allied with and to the Mutanimals. "And we must make sure that we do so without running into any major problems."

Bishop was contacted again by his employer. "What is going on?" He asked.

"The turtles and the snake girl got away." Bishop answered, barely keeping his anger in check. "They were rescued by some other humans and the Mutanimals."

His employer sighed. "The Mutanimals. I forgot that they were still alive here right now." He admitted. "That will have to change shortly." He changed the subject. "What of the girl? Is she what you wanted?"

"We analyzed her as they entered the base. She has some interesting readings about her, just as the red head did. But her abilities aren't what I need." Bishop answered. "But they'll be back for the second piece of the eye of sarnath and we'll catch them then."

Can the team retrieve the second fragment? What plans do Bishop and his employer have for the team? What is the extent of the armor Angel has that has been dubbed Nightwatcher? The adventure continues.


	50. Bend in the Road

"So how do we get ahold of this second fragment anyway?" Raph asked as he ran his fingers gently through Jennifer's long blonde hair. The group was gathered in the living area, the one place in the lair where they could all be comfortable in some form or another. The four turtle brothers sat on the couch with their girlfriends. Off to the edge Adelita and Angel sat together. Casey and Karai shared a bean bag chair and the Mutanimals sat on the ledge above the couch, Candy lying against Mondo with his arms around her waist.

"We need some way to infiltrate that base." Angel declared. Since returning to the lair she had deactivated what she was starting to think of as the Nightwatcher armor. "Or maybe a direct assault."

"A direct assault would be dumb." Karai pointed out. "We're not dealing with the Foot Clan here, who at least will pretty much fight the way we will. We're dealing with some form of government agency that has no problems shooting us full of holes."

"Like swiss cheese." Mikey added and got glares from his brothers though Renet giggled.

Karai rolled her eyes. "Yes, like swiss cheese." She allowed reluctantly. "And unlike most of the gangs around here, those guys are actually decently competent."

"Don't I know it." Renet sighed as she rubbed her arm. Though Jennifer's healing abilities had come through for her the memory of the bullet through the arm and through the stomach were still fresh in her mind.

"I'd feel much better about trying to infiltrate if we could find some kind of schematic." Donnie voiced with a shrug. "But if it's really a government lab then there is nothing we can find before we get there."

"Are we even sure that they have the second fragment?" Casey asked.

"As sure as we can be." April answered with a shrug. She ran Donnie's tail masks in between her fingers as she spoke. "The energy signature is still there. If it was a false reading meant to trap us I would think they would have turned it off by now."

"Not necessarily." Splinter reminded the red head gently. "Since we cannot be certain of that one way or another they may believe that leaving it on to attract us may be a gamble worth trying."

"I still can't figure out why that Bishop guy seemed so interested in you though." Aaliyah said as she looked to the lithe blonde.

"The only thing I can figure is that somehow Bishop knows about the experiments my father did on me." Jennifer replied.

"But why not O'Neill too?" Karai asked.

"Because we might have similar powers but we came about them differently." April said. "Mine was by the Kraang while Jennifer's is…" She looked to her. "We're not sure actually."

"I've been starting to think somehow they might be demonic in their origins." Jennifer admitted softly. "I mean my telekinetic abilities match up with that one vaguely female looking spider demon."

"What about the healing? The empathic thing?" Donnie asked.

"We do not know that the empathic thing wasn't more than a fluke right now." Splinter reminded his son. "As for the healing, we all know that we mutants have a better ability to regenerate than humans. I have read legends that suggest demons have the same healing factors, if not better."

"Does that mean Jennifer is part demon?" Adelita asked a bit nervously.

"No." April answered. "At least I don't think so. I would hope my powers were advanced enough that if she were anything other than human on a genetic level that I would sense some impression of it."

"I would tend to agree." Splinter said. "I too do not feel anything…demonic about her."

"She's not a demon." Renet stated simply. Though she knew that revealing that could be against some time code she couldn't put anyone, especially her blonde friend, through that uncertainty.

"Great, glad we have that settled." Raph said. "So what about the fragment?"

"I could try scouting out the location for a while." Pigeon Pete volunteered.

"I don't think that's a good idea." Leo relied. "They know who you are and as Karai pointed out they have no problem killing us for their objectives."

"I have to side with Leonardo." Slash said.

Adelita kind of raised her hand as if she were in school seeking permission to talk. Part of that stemmed from the fact she didn't really know or feel comfortable with anyone there except Aaliyah in a way and partly because she knew that she really didn't have a place in the strategy meeting. "What about trying to observe the place from a small distance, a nearby warehouse maybe. Like a stakeout."

"That might work." Aaliyah said, automatically trying to side with her sister.

"Actually that is not a bad idea." Splinter agreed. "We might be able to get a sense of how many men they have there."

"On top of that with some surveillance and ultrasonic equipment I might be able to make our own map for the place." Donnie added enthusiastically.

"The warehouse that we used to get from roof level to street level when we tried to infiltrate the first time might work well." Leo agreed. "Hole up there for a day or so and see what we can do with that time."

"I believe it would be in everyone's best interest if we worked together on this." Rockwell said. "Donatello and I can try to make a map twice as fast and if discovered there are also twice as many defenders."

Splinter nodded. "I agree with you Professor Rockwell."

"I could even use the doorway function to get us there." Renet said. "Whoever is going, that is."

That left a good question. Who all should be going. Three of them had school the next day and several of them were especially vulnerable if something really bad were to happen. They still weren't sure about the extent of Bishop and the EDF's abilities right now.

"April, Casey, Angel." Splinter said. "You must not miss your education just because of this. You will have to sit out of the stakeout. Jennifer, Renet, I believe the two of you should sit out of this one as well, it is simply too dangerous."

None of them were too happy about that, with the first three wanting to raise their own protests. Angel did have the most valid point with her armor making her bulletproof and the fact they might need her if they get the second fragment.

"Well, assuming nothing happens during school hours, you three could come by the lair afterwards. They can contact us by T-phone and I can simply take us there." Renet suggested, offering the only compromise she could think of.

"I think that's a good idea." Jennifer said. "I know it's dangerous but we can't just completely sit this out."

Splinter let out a sigh but nodded. "Very well." He conceded. "Jennifer and Renet will remain here in the morning. Once you three come back from school the five of you can go over to the stakeout for a while."

Donnie went to his lab and came out with the equipment he thought he would need to start charting a map of the underground compound they had found their way into. Then Renet opened up a doorway. Raph, Karai and Donnie each gave their respective lovers a kiss as Aaliyah and Adelita exchanged hugs. Then the five turtles, Karai and the Mutanimals went through the portal.

After arriving Renet leaned up and exchanged a soft kiss on the lips with Mikey before going back through the portal. Donnie and Rockwell started to set up their mapping equipment.

"I think we need to order some pizzas here pretty soon." Mikey said. "Otherwise it's going to get boring pretty quickly."

"I think deliver y could tip them off." Karai pointed out.

"I suppose someone could go get it." Aaliyah suggested.

"That might draw just as much attention." Leo replied as he looked out the window across from the subway access. He was starting to think some of these buildings above the tunnels must have some kind of connection to them as well. "Let's just take it as it comes."

Only a couple hours had passed when Mikey started again wanting some form of food around there. Leatherhead, Slash, Karai, Raph and Leo had taken positions to watch the general area while Donnie and Rockwell worked on the map they were hoping to develop. That left the others to hang around and wait for something to happen. Aaliyah knew that pretty soon they would have to make some kind of sleeping arrangements and guard details.

Then Karai cocked her head. "Did you hear that?" She asked them. The kunoichi wasn't entirely sure if she actually heard something or felt something, she remembered somewhere that snakes could feel vibrations, and she was half one now.

"I thought I heard some sort of explosion as well." Leatherhead agreed.

All speculation ended as a mixture of Footbots and Dark Oni jumped out of several of the windows of a building that Leo suspected might be attached to the underground base. Right behind them was Tiger Claw with his jet pack and Hector with bat wings. Right after them was a group of soldiers making vain attempts to shoot any of them down, though only a few Dark Oni were hit and they vanished upon impact.

"Why would they want to attack EDF?" Donnie asked.

Aaliyah took up a pair of binoculars that they had brought with them if they needed a closer view from their position. She saw what it was almost instantly. "Hector has the second fragment." She declared.

"We should have done the frontal assault Angel mentioned after all." Raph said.

"No we shouldn't have." Leo said to his brother. "Remember that Shredder doesn't care if the Footbots are destroyed and we're not even sure the Dark Oni can truly be destroyed." He now looked around to all of him as he hoped to remind them the truth of this statement. "None of us are so expendable."

"We better intercept them and get that sarnath fragment." Aaliyah said.

"She's right." Slash said. "Before they get out of range."

Leo nodded. "Let's do it." The team got up and left the room they had chosen to borrow and went to the rooftop. They had to jump a few buildings to catch up with them and they had no chance to make a battle plan beyond take the fragment from Hector. Raph however was glad that Jennifer wasn't here for Hector to try to get to.

Karai drew a few shurikens and tossed them straight at Tiger Claw's jet pack as Raph made a springing jump and landed straight on Hector's back with his sais embedding into the shifter's wings. Both of the lead mutants fell out of the sky and toward the ground though while Tiger Claw made a graceful rolling landing Hector fell with a slight crash since he had an angry turtle on his back.

The others landed on the roof and were ready to go as the Footbots and the Dark Oni turned around to see what had caused the commotion and found what had caused the problem. With that both sets of minions attacked.

"Mutanimals, help Aaliyah and Karai deal with the Footbots and the Dark Oni." Slash ordered Rockwell, Mondo Gecko, Pidgeon Pete, Leatherhead and Candy. "I'll keep Tiger Claw busy." He looked to Leo. "I think you and your brothers should help Raphael deal with Hector."

Leo nodded. "Alright, sounds like a plan." He looked to Donnie and Mikey. "Let's get to it bros."

Slash attempted to bring his mace down on Tiger Claw's head but the tiger assassin dodged out of the way and launched a kick to Slash's stomach in order to get him back and then he drew his lasers and started to fire at the large black masked mutant turtle but he dodged it rather swiftly for a mutant of his size.

The rest of the Mutanimals, Karai and Aaliyah started to easily cut through the Footbots and the Dark Oni. They really were no threat.

As the three turtles started to approach Hector Mikey noticed his hands and asked, "Dudes, where did he drop the fragrance?"

"I think you mean fragment Mikey." The purple masked turtle responded before he fully processed his younger brother's question. "Wait a minute. Where did Hector drop the fragment?"

"Sewer apples." Leo mumbled for a moment and then looked to his brothers. "I don't know. We need to keep an eye out for it as we fight Hector." They intercepted Hector as he slashed at the red masked turtle and then they all surrounded him.

"Do you really think you guys can really stop me?" Hector asked with a laugh. "You've already tried this and failed."

"And we'll keep trying until we get it right." Mikey answered. "Or we'll die trying."

"That can be arranged." Hector promised as he formed two sets of thin spider like arms on both sides, each equipped with scythe like instruments. "In fact I'm looking forward to feasting on turtle soup."

Hector swiped at each of the turtles with his mantis scythes and while Mikey back flipped out of the way and Donnie dodged under it both Leo and Raph used their bladed weapons to block the attacks. "This almost feels like a two on one thing." Raph noted. "Or at least an eight on four."

"Yeah and all from one dude." Mikey added as he moved back up to try to help his brother's take out the shifting mutant.

Hector swung again and Leo angled his katana blades to chop off the mantis scythes that were aimed at him. The shifter growled angrily and tried to turn his attention to the blue masked turtle only for Raph and Donnie to slam into their mutant adversary. They saw a medallion snap off of his chest.

"I think that's what uses to control the Dark Oni." Donnie said.

"Get it Mikey." Leo ordered.

"On it dudes." The orange masked turtle said and leapt toward it. He miscalculated and was unable to get a hold of the medallion as it tumbled off the roof. He quickly looked over the edge to see it slip between the sewer grates and vanish. "Drag."

"Mikey, where is it?" Raph asked him as Hector tried to swipe at him again.

"It took a trip into the sewers." Mikey answered as he turned away and headed back toward his brothers.

"Just great." Raph growled with a roll of his eyes.

"We'll have to figure out how to track it later." Leo said. "After we get rid of these guys and find the fragment."

That did produce one positive effect as the Dark Oni disappeared into the shadows, halving the threats that Karai, Aaliyah, and the Mutanimals needed to deal with. That allowed them to focus on the Footbots and Leatherhead decided he should go assist their leader.

Tiger Claw had dropped his lasers and withdrew a sharp edged blade and was now clashing with the giant mutant turtle. He dodged one of the mace attacks and then delivered a hard kick to him and then tried to deliver a killing blow when the large gator mutant shoulder rammed hard into Tiger Claw. "I will not let you hurt my friend." He declared.

"You have no choice." Tiger Claw growled as he now faced off against the two mutants. "I can take both of you on with ease." He then started to clash again with the two mutants.

Hector jumped past each of the turtles and then turned into a massive bull like creature before he charged straight at them, hoping to impale at least one turtle on his way through. But even as Raph and Leo dodged the attack Mikey and Donnie took a step behind and then used their bo staff and kusarigama chain to trip him up. Hector found himself flying off of the hind legs and before he could do anything the red masked turtle followed up with an uppercut to the shifter's jaw, making him land hard on what would be his back, and he shifted back into his normal human form.

The Footbots were very quickly getting dispatched and both Aaliyah and Karai were thinking it was safe to go help the brothers with Hector. Mondo Gecko looked up at them after slamming his skateboard into a Footbot. "We got this ladies, go help the turtles out."

Candy took one of the katana and slammed it into another Footbots chest. "You heard Mondo, take out that overgrown chameleon wannabe." She stated.

"Let's do it." Karai said as she looked at Aaliyah and then the two girls started over to the four brothers.

Hector stood up as the four brothers got back in formation. He formed lobster claws and dug them in to the building, about ready to toss a huge chunk at them before Karai delivered a kick to the back of his head and Aaliyah swept his legs out from under him. He rose to be surrounded by six figures now.

"This is over Hector." Raph said to him. "You're going to regret messing with my girlfriend."

"You're going to regret messing with this family." Aaliyah stated.

They heard some thumping sounds and they turned to see smoke grenades that had landed on the roof. Karai could just barely make out the silhouette of four stealth Footbots before the grenades exploded and created a massive smokescreen.

"Everyone okay?" Slash called out as he tried to brush away the smoke. He got affirmatives from Mondo, Rockwell, Leathehead, Pete and Candy, all of who were doing the same thing.

"How about on this end?" Leo asked as he tried to do the same thing. He got affirmatives from his younger brothers, his older sister and Aaliyah. "At least everyone is accounted for."

"It seems as if Tiger Claw, Hector, and the remainder of the Footbots have escaped." Leatherhead said.

"Search the area for the sarnath fragment." Leo ordered the team. It took a few minutes to do so but when they got back together they were all empty handed.

Raph sighed in frustration. "One of those stealth bots must have gotten their hands on the fragment." He muttered.

"So not only do we have a fragment to find again, there is still one out there and we have at Oni medallion to find now?" Mikey asked. "This is getting intense guys."

"How are we going to find that thing anyway?" Aaliyah asked.

Leo sighed softly. "I honestly don't know Aaliyah." He admitted.

"Me neither." Donnie said. "Unlike the sarnath fragments we have no concrete way of tracking the medallion. No energy signature or knowledge of what it's made of."

"I guess we don't have to watch the EDF facility anymore." Mikey said, trying to look on the bright side.

"I wish I could agree with that." Leo said. "We still might have to deal with them again at some point, though getting that fragment back is more important."

"We should be able to leave the equipment there for the original time." Donnie said. "We can go back and get it later and see what it's unveiled."

"That will have to do." Leo decided. "In the meantime I guess we're going to have to let the others know what happened."

"Report." Bishop ordered as he entered the room. Most of the soldiers were intimidated by the man's presence and stern gaze. A few soldiers didn't react. And though they didn't look happy about the situation both Doctor Malcom and Sergeant Thomas sure didn't seem intimidated either.

"It was the Foot Clan." Thomas answered for them. "They had broken in, we're still not sure how. They stole the second fragment of the eye of sarnath."

"First the Mutanimals weren't taken into account when trying to trap the turtle's human allies and now the Foot Clan weren't taken into account now." Bishop mused as he crossed his arms over his chest. "Why exactly is this becoming so difficult?"

"You should watch it Agent Bishop." Malcom said with a tone in his voice that the agent never would have tolerated from his underlings. Of course that was why he had introduced the doctor and the sergeant as colleagues, they certainly weren't under his command. "If you wish to be granted what you seek then you will remember that that fragment holds no real value to us."

"Yes, yes." Bishop sighed. "I know. I just dislike the enemy getting the drop on us like this. If they can do so now then I dread what will happen when it actually becomes important."

"When it becomes important," Thomas voiced. "We will have more than just these soldiers backing us up."

Tiger Claw and Hector entered Shredder's throne room with the Footbots and the stealth Footbots. One of them held the second fragment of the sarnath. That bot knelt in front of Shredder as the villain rose and approached them. He reached out and took the small fragment, about the size of a quarter. "This is a piece of the eye of sarnath that the Kraang are so interested in?" He questioned.

"So it would seem master." Tiger Claw answered as he bowed.

Shredder looked at it curiously. "Take this to Stockman. He said he had a way to test out how strong the power of this small fragment would be." He ordered.

The medallion flowed through the sewer water until it suddenly stopped. It levitated up out of the water and floated straight into a right hand into the shadows. Then the figure stepped out ,the moonlight reflecting off of Fulcanelli's grey hair. "This will help bring hell to Earth." He said with an amused smile. "Now to get the next step going."

The team returned to the lair, being greeted in surprise by Master Splinter, Jennifer, Renet and Adelita. "What is going on? What are you doing back here so soon?" The rat master asked.

"We didn't need to stay there long father." Leo answered. "Tiger Claw, Hector and the Foot stole the second fragment of the eye of sarnath from the EDF base."

"Oh, no." Adelita gasped softly.

"Why did they do that?" Jennifer asked them.

"That's a damn good question." Raph answered softly. "But whatever it is I'm sure we're not going to like it."

What plans do Shredder and the Foot Clan have for the second fragment? Where is the third fragment? What is it that Bishop is seeking? With Fulcanelli's return what plans does he have? The adventure continues.


	51. Upgraded

Shredder entered Stockman's lab being flanked by Tiger Claw and Hector. Behind them were Bradford and Xever. Stockman buzzed down to meet the bladed master. "How are you progressing Stockman?" He asked the fly.

"We are on ssschedule, massster." Stockman answered. "I sssuccesssfully reverssse engineered one of the Kraang'sss Footbotsss to make the next ssstage of them." He flew off to one of the consoles and started to press some buttons. "They can deal with the turtlesss and their alliesss when they come out of hiding to find the sssignal of the fragment and then we can unleasssh our final weapon on them and put them out of our misssery."

"Where is the second fragment?" Tiger Claw asked.

"The fragment isss being usssed as the power sssource for the final weapon." Stockman answered him. "We ssshall tessst to sssee how powerful thisss sssarnath piece really isss."

"This had better work." Shredder said to the fly mutant. "Or else you might find yourself lacking wings to get around with."

The door opened again and two of his henchman; the rhino mutant Ivan Steranko and the warthog mutant Anton Zeck came in. They stopped before Shredder and somewhat reluctantly bowed before him.

"Zeck, Steranko, I want you two to lead them into battle against the turtles." Shredder ordered. "Bring them to me or Tiger Claw will teach you another lesson in pain."

"We won't fail you master Shredder." Zeck promised him as they rose to leave the lab.

"Any luck finding the signature of the second fragment?" Leo asked as he poked his head into the lab where both Donnie and Rockwell were working. The Mutanimals had agreed to lend their aid for finding the fragments.

"Not yet." Donnie said. "Shredder must have found some way to camouflage the signatures."

"Undoubtfully due to some assistance from the Kraang." Rockwell added. "It makes sense since they already knew they were going to crash land on Earth before you all even knew they existed,"

"If only we knew what they were going to do with it." Aaliyah said as she stood behind Leo, her hands on his shell, which in truth sent some shivers through the blue masked turtle's body. "Then maybe we could at least try to stop the before they do something stupid."

"What could they even do with one tiny fragment?" Mikey questioned with a shrug.

"Remember that Kraang power cell Leatherhead was guarding?" Donnie asked him.

"Um…maybe." Mikey said.

His older brother's rolled their eyes. "I remember it." Raph said. "You said it could power anything with the right stuff, like a flashlight…or a city on the moon."

"Pretty sure I said components." Donnie corrected him. "Well that fragment can do basically the same thing."

"So it's good then?" Mikey asked.

"On its own it's already powerful." April said. "But if combined with that third fragment…" She started.

"Or the fragment in my Nightwatcher armor." Angel added.

"Then it would be even stronger." Donnie said. "And if all three fragments were put together." The purple masked turtle shook his head. "I don't know what it could do."

"Why is it basically customized for Angel's armor?" Karai asked. "Is it meant to do something more?"

"I don't know." Angel answered for them. "I haven't noticed any real difference between the armor before I found the first fragment and the armor afterwards."

"And if there is something special I can't detect it." Donnie filled in. "Though the truth is it might not be something that could be noticed until Angel finds out what it is and activates it."

The Latina girl rolled her eyes and groused, "Great, no pressure or anything."

Adelita, Jennifer and Renet laughed a little at that.

Angel rolled her eyes. "Glad you three liked that." She said but she had a small smile on her face as she looked from Renet to Jennifer before stopping at Adelita. "Anything I can do to amuse."

"No one said it would be easy Angel." Splinter said to her gently yet sternly. The mixture of paternal pride and annoyance wasn't exactly something she was used too. "But you will figure it out when the time is right. And we will do what we can do help you in that task."

"Yeah, uh, thanks." Angel said uncomfortably.

Then Donnie looked up and said, "Uh oh. It's trap time." When Leo looked back at him he elaborated, "The energy signature for the sarnath fragment is back on the radar."

"We have no choice but to go after it." Leo said. "All we can do is be prepared."

"How do we be prepared for what we know nothing about?" Jennifer asked him.

Rockwell looked at one of the monitors that had been temporarily set up. "According to what I can see on the satellite the signature is coming from a rather large warehouse at the docks." He informed them all. "It's either a huge maze or a storage facility of some sort."

"Yeah, for storing the statue of liberty." Raph added sarcastically.

"Like in Ghostbusters." Mikey added with a laugh.

Leo thought a moment as he glanced around the lair. Then he said, "Donnie, Rockwell. Join us out here. Then I'm going to suggest a course of action and let's see what we can come up with."

A couple hours later they had their plan set. The four turtle brothers, Aaliyah, Karai, the Mighty Mutanimals, and Angel made their way to the warehouse where the signature was located at. So far it had been easy going and that made them even surer this was a trap.

As they approached the docks they saw Bebop and Rocksteady step out from the shadows. "Look what we have here Bebop." Rocksteady said. "We have turtles, armor person and other assorted freaks."

"I told you I ain't no Bebop." The mutant warthog snapped. Then he looked to them. "I owe you turtle freaks for this you know."

Raph laughed at them. "I don't think you two should be talking about who's a freak around here." He replied.

"Aren't you two safari animals a bit outnumbered?" Angel, now fully outfitted in her Nightwatcher armor including the voice modulator, questioned them both.

"These safari animals have gone high tech baby." Bebop answered with a snort laugh. "Compliments of the fly man." From the shadows emerged something new. They looked like the Footbots the Kraang engineered for the Foot Clan a couple years ago but these guys were more along the height of Slash and Leatherhead and in addition to their katana or various other weapons the robots carried they also had knee and arm pads like the Shredder, razor sharp blades protruding from them.

"I don't think we want these guys trying to give us a gut check." Raph noted wryly.

"I tend to agree." Rockwell said.

"Turtles, Mutanimals." Rocksteady said cockily. "Meet Superfootbots." He laughed then.

"And I hope they tear you all to shreds." Bebop added and then followed up with his own laugh.

The Superfootbots ran right toward the turtles. Mikey swore he was the ground under them shaking slightly as they moved in.

The turtles drew their weapons. "What now Leo?" Donnie asked.

"Aaliyah, Angel get into that warehouse." Leo said to the two of them. "The rest of us will keep these guys busy."

"These guys can't be that tough." Raph declared and with his sais drawn he leapt at a Superfootbot only to be met with a hard uppercut to his jaw from his mechanical opponent. With a hard landing Raph relented, "Okay, I might be wrong."

Leatherhead now roared and charged at another one. The Superfootbot raised its arms to intercept the mutant gator and they were now involved in a struggle for power, an edge over the other.

"Wow, this doesn't look too good." Pete noted nervously. "Do we have plan b for this?"

"Afraid not." Slash said simply. "We're going to have to give it our all." With that he went in intending to bash his mace into a Superfootbot but the mechanical menace caught the spiked end in his hand and then thrust it back, the handle end hitting Slash in the face.

Angel and Aaliyah moved under the confrontation going on only to find themselves to face Bebop and Rocksteady. "And where do you think you're going?" Bebop asked the two of them. He then twirled and unleashed his hip lasers on the two of them. Aaliyah dodged instantly.

Angel tried to stand her ground, thinking that the Nightwatcher armor could simply reflect it like it had the bullets that the EDF guys had fired. Instead it struck her and sent her back for a moment; in addition the sound of the strike seemed to reside in her head for a moment. "Okay, don't take the laser hits head on." She noted to herself.

Rocksteady then tried to gore her but she brought her hands up and caught him by the horn before twirling around and tossing him at his warthog partner. Only a quick dodge prevented him from getting squashed by his partner, but by that time Aaliyah had lashed out and connected with his jaw.

Leo and Raph each dodged a Superfootbot that was approaching them and then tried to bring their weapons down on them but they moved quickly enough to use their razor edged arm pads to block the attacks, and then as if in synch they hit the two turtles hard in the jaw. "That's getting annoying." Raph noted as he rubbed his jaw.

Mikey dodged an attack from one of the Superfootbots as he joked, "Maybe they got tired of hearing us talk."

Raph dodged a follow up attack from the Superfootbot that went after him as he replied with, "If I could I'd show you who's tired of hearing who talk."

Karai was able to dodge the attack from a couple of Superfootbots but only because she had to tap into her snake abilities. "I guess Stockman knew what he was doing when he upgraded the original Kraang designs." She had to reluctantly grant. The problem came that she couldn't get much of a hit on her opponent either.

"Yeah, I hate to say it but if he weren't working for Shredder he might actually be good to work with." Donnie said as he tried to stab a Superfootbot with his naginata but the robot grabbed it and tossed the purple masked turtle hard, almost into the water.

Pete got swatted very hard as he tried to attack a Superfootbot and landed just as hard. Mondo and Candy tried to double team another but both were swatted aside almost as if they were a mosquito. Rockwell levitated above the fray but any attempts to toss something at them were summarily knocked aside.

"Dudes, we've got to come up with something here before they beat us down." Mikey said as he dodged another attack.

Rockwell glanced around for a moment. Then he had an idea. He didn't want to broadcast it to the Superfootbots just in case they could somehow understand what was being said. So he thought he'd try something else, and if this worked he'd have to teach Ms. O'Neil how to do it too. He focused really hard and shot out a mental _Gentlemen…I mean everyone_ to those fighting the robots. He had to remind himself that was Karai were here after all. He didn't include Aaliyah and Angel since they were busy with Bebop and Rocksteady.

Everyone looked around slightly confused. "What the hell was that?" Raph wondered.

"I think that was Rockwell." Donnie told him. "Telepathically." He shook his head in amazement. "Wow that is awesome. He took that mind reading thing he does and instead of reading our thoughts he's reflecting his thoughts to our mind."

"Swell." Raph drolled much less enthusiastically. "Why?"

 _I have an idea on how to take these Superfootbots out._ The monkey mutant answered, once again telepathically. _In order to do that we're going to have to get them together. We need to lure them to that lamp post over on the far side of the warehouse docks. I believe I can douse them with a rush of ocean water but in order to get them to short circuit we are going to have to destroy the lamp post and deliver the electrical charges to them._

"I think Leatherhead and I can handle that doc." Slash told his primate team mate.

"Fall back team." Leo ordered them all, under the pretense of leading them toward Rockwell's ultimate goal. "Our objective is still in front of us." With weapons still drawn the team made their way over.

This left Aaliyah and Angel still dealing with the mutant duo. Since Rockwell had not included them in the plan Angel felt kind of confused. "What the hell are they trying to do?" She wondered.

Aaliyah wasn't entirely sure. "Maybe use the electrical energy in the lamp post to short circuit the Superfootbots, though I would think that would be difficult. They seemed much sturdier than the Footbots we've all grown to know and loathe." The female turtle speculated.

"I suggest you worry less about comrades and worry more about yourself." Rocksteady interjected as he took out his hammer and sickle and tried to smash Aaliyah between the two large metal weapons. The white masked mutant jumped above the attack and then kicked him right in the nose…snout…she wasn't quite sure what the appropriate terminology would have been.

Bebop used his laser Mohawk to try to shoot at Angel but she dodged that one easily enough and followed up with her own uppercut to his face. He sprawled awkwardly. "Yo, big S. I think we should switch opponents over here." He called out.

Angel laughed at that "You really think Aaliyah is going to be easier for you to take out?" She questioned amused.

"Is fine comrade Bebop." Rocksteady decided as he got up and immediately started toward the armored vigilante. He had already learned that trying to impale this opponent was not a good idea. "I squash him like the tin can already present."

"Him?" Angel questioned incredulously. "You think because I'm kicking your ugly hides all around here that I got to be a guy?"

"Like anyone could really tell with the modulator." Aaliyah pointed out to their new friend.

"That's not the point." Angel said as she dodged the attack from Rocksteady and kicked him in the side hard.

"I don't care who or what you are." Rocksteady told the vigilante. "I will crush you into metal and flesh paste and then give you to Zeck to give to piranha." He swung at her again with the hammer.

Angel caught the hammer though it did leave a slight ringing in her ears as it connected with the armor. She was getting the idea she should get used to that sort of effect, but if that's the worst that ever happened the Latina decided she would be grateful for that. "That is such a nasty image I don't even know how to respond to that."

Karai and the turtles made their way to the lamp post but as they were doing so they discovered a whole new problem with their new adversaries. The Superfootbots had started to blast laser beams at them from their eyes. "I think we better take one of these back to the lair to get a better understanding of it." Donnie said.

"Yeah, that sounds safe." Mikey commented.

"By the time they short circuit they'll be all but useless anyway." Donnie reminded them.

They reached the lamp post and looked as if they were getting ready for a fight, possibly for a last stand. Leatherhead even positioned himself to get ready to push the lamp post down. As the Superfootbots approached Rockwell struggled to gain the necessary control over the water in order to soak them. It wasn't an easy thing to do but he managed to get just enough control over a naturally oncoming wave to wash over their robotic foes.

Then Leatherhead pushed at the lamp post and he was joined moments later by Slash. The two large mutants were able to push it over easily and the sparking lamp post crashed into a couple of the Superfootbots and the electricity cascaded around them, causing them to overload and fall to the ground in multiple heaps. It reminded Leo and Raph a little bit off the time they did that to Stockman's mousers. They just hoped that more of them wouldn't show up as the mousers had back then.

As that happened Aaliyah and Angel paced the two mutant goons until the two were back to back. Then the girls jumped up and kicked the two mutants hard in the stomach and as they recoiled they ran right into each other's backs. A follow up punch from each of the girls rendered them unconscious.

"Serves them right." Angel commented and Aaliyah had to laugh a little.

"Come on." The female turtle said once she had stopped laughing. "Let's join the others and get that sarnath fragment out of the warehouse."

The two girls joined the team and they started again toward the warehouse. "It had better not be that hard to find the damn thing." Raph said as they came to the warehouse door. "I just want to get this mission over and done with."

"Just stay calm Raph." Leo told him. "We'll be out of here in a few minutes."

Slash and Leatherhead had to work a moment to get the large warehouse doors opened. Both Donnie and Rockwell found it odd that the doors were large and very tall rather than the normal long shape most warehouse doors tended to have.

When they had forced the doors opened they had only take a couple of steps when they were able to see what was inside the warehouse. Mikey gasped. "Holy giant foot bot."

"Wow." Karai said. "I never even knew the Foot were developing something like this."

Mikey's assessment was quiet literal. They were looking up at a giant version of the Superfootbot that they had spent the last few minutes in a downhill fight against. And on the very top of its forehead they could see a glittering red object; the second fragment of the eye of sarnath.

"Guess we're going to have to scale this thing to get it." Mondo commented.

Only a few more steps were taken before they heard electrical humming. Then a large whirring sound as the Giant Superfootbot looked down at them. Then it shot its foot out hard and they all barely dodged out of the way of the massive foot.

"That's just great." Raph said. "Now we gotta deal with Godzilla's hidden enemy."

They all backed out of the warehouse. The Giant Superfootbot was literally right there, able to take more massive steps than any of them could possibly compensate for. It looked down at them and they all could swear if it was possible that the thing actually was looking forward to stomping them out of existence.

How can the team combat something so huge? Can they retrieve the second fragment with such a massive obstacle in their way? Are there more Superfootbots? The adventure continues.


	52. Robo Clash

Each of them looked up at the Giant Superfootbot that was looking down at them. One stomp of its massive robotic foot would be enough to take out even Slash or Leatherhead.

"This would be so neat if we weren't going to be the ones that were road pavement." Mondo said nervously.

"Just remember what we discussed earlier guys." Leo said even as his hand brought out his T-phone and pressed a key.

Earlier at the lair each of them had thought it very bizarre that they would have access to such a large warehouse. The only thing that made sense was they had something big in there. Perhaps an ambush. But April, Donnie, Mikey and Raph couldn't also help but think of the giant droid thing Kraang Prime had operated during the second Kraang invasion. And it had taken everything for the Turtle Mech to take it out, to say nothing of Kraang Prime himself.

"We could try blowing the place up." Pete suggested.

"That would attract too much attention." Donnie reminded the sometimes slow witted mutant Pidgeon. "And on top of that we can't prove that the fragment would survive the explosion."

"What do you think they would have in there anyway?" Adelita asked as she leaned forward and folded her hands together, wanting to help in this way however she could. She already knew combat was out of the question.

"Something big." Leo said. "To that end I think its best that we go in on two fronts. The first is a frontal assault to see what happens and do what damage we can. The second is preparation for whatever could be in that warehouse."

"We don't know what's in the warehouse." Raph replied snappishly.

"We know it's big." Jennifer reminded her boyfriend gently. "Let's hear Leo out."

Leo took a deep breath and then said, "If we need it, the second phase is going to go in with…"

They continued to back off of from the Giant Superfootbot and it came toward them steadily. It seemed more than willing to step on them unsurprisingly.

They heard the laughter from the recovered mutant duo. "Looks like we have turtle paste to take back to Shredder." Rocksteady said. "Not to mention other such paste."

"That is going to look so nasty." His partner Bebop noted and then cackled in amusement.

Then the ground shook with another large footstep but the mutant warthog had been looking toward the Giant Superfootbot at the time and it had not moved. "Hey, Baby S. Why is the ground shaking like that?" He asked.

"What are you talking about comrade Zeck?" Rocksteady questioned. He glanced around and then added, "Oh that is why."

From around the corner came the Turtle Mech, also known as the second phase. Piloting it was April, Jennifer, Casey and Renet. "Again I have to say this is so metal." Casey commented.

Renet laughed. "This is so awesome. I never thought I'd actually be able to pilot the Turtle Mech." She remarked.

April grimaced just a bit. "Yeah, too bad we have to go against that thing." She mused.

"Mikey would no doubt point out that Super Robo Mecha Force Team Five has faced things bigger than this." Casey reminded them.

"I think they fought those things in something a little more…sturdy." Jennifer replied. She thought the device was certainly remarkable but the thought that this battle relied, at least in part, on her made her nervous. "Or at least a bit more protected." She added as she waved her hands in front of the area where she thought some sort of retractable plastic shielding should be.

"Too late to worry about that now." Renet reminded the lithe blonde as the Giant Superfootbot saw the Turtle Mech and immediately moved to engage it in a fight, perhaps recognizing that it was more of a threat to it than the small beings that had been standing way underneath it.

"Fire the harpoon." Jennifer suggested to April.

The red head nodded. "Good a way to start as any." She aimed the harpoon at the center of the Giant Superfootbot and fired. The thing dodged the attack and grabbed it, then pulled the Turtle Mech toward it, intending to punch hard and possibly take out the humans inside.

Jennifer moved her console and raised the right leg so that it impacted with the Giant Superfootbot and kicked it back, forcing it to release the harpoon. Casey followed up on the top left side to deliver a punch to their adversary.

"Isn't there anything we can do to help them?" Raph asked in general, hating to be on the sidelines and also worried about Jennifer. This was her first time and if it could be said of them at all she was not adequately trained to pilot it, it was just the safest of the available options.

"I don't think so." Donnie answered simply. "That thing is just too big for any of us to make an impact against, even Slash and Leatherhead."

"Maybe there is something that we could do." Rockwell interrupted. "I think part of the reason it's so powerful is because of the boosts from the fragment of the eye of sarnath."

Donnie nodded excitedly as he got it, the purple bandana ends moving with his nodding movements. "I get it; if we can figure out how to remove that fragment then we can bring that down to an easier to beat level for them."

"That's all fine and good." Pete interrupted them. "But how do we get to that thing's head when it can swat us aside like a crumb of sourdough?"

"What if they aim for its head?" Karai asked.

"It might destroy the fragment." Angel replied. "Is that something we can risk?"

"Donnie, what would happen if we have to destroy that fragment?" Aaliyah asked the purple masked turtle.

"I wish I knew." Donnie admitted simply. "But with the power in even a fragment I'd imagine it would be a huge explosion, enough to take us out and at least the entire block."

"Okay, so not a good thing." Karai conceded.

"Raph, Karai, you're with me." Leo said. "We're going to climb that thing and get the fragment."

"Hey, what are we supposed to do?" Mikey asked their blue masked leader.

"Maybe we can talk to them?" Pete suggested as he saw the regular variety Footbots coming toward them from the warehouse now.

"Well damn." Angel said. "They're just full of surprises aren't they?"

"At least it gives us something to do." Slash said as he raised his mace. "So let's get to work." He looked to Leo, then Karai and then Raph. "Good luck getting that fragment brother."

"I'd give you some luck but you got the easy job." Raph commented back with a smile. "So just lead them all into some fun." With that the two turtles and Karai started to run over to the building sized battle going on not too far from them as the Donnie, Mikey, Aaliyah, Angel and the Mutanimals got ready to, as it was once put, to bash some bots.

Renet used the left leg to move in a bit as April used the right arm to clobber the Giant Superfootbot with now retracted harpoon up front and managed to smash against it, leaving a small gash there where they could see the circuitry. Then it brought its arm up and smashed the top of the Turtle Mech, causing each of them to have to hold onto the controls and make sure they were still strapped in.

"That thing hits pretty hard." Renet said. "Probably because it's a giant metal robot thing."

"Let' see what it thinks of this." Casey declared and pressed a button that would change the arm he controlled from a regular arm into a flamethrower and aimed it at the Giant Superfootbot. April noticed out of the corner of her eye three figures leap up from the ground and onto the back of what would be the robot's thigh. She then realized what she was seeing. Leo and Raph were using their weapons to ascend up the Footbot while Karai was using her newly 'gifted' mutant snake powers and snake hands to climb up herself.

April used her own mech hand to clamp onto the mech hand Casey controlled as she said, "We can't just fry it. Leo, Raph and Karai are climbing up on it."

Jennifer gasped in shock and even some fear. "What? Why would Raph…why would they do that?" She asked.

"They must be trying to go for the sarnath fragment." April speculated. "The only thing reason I can think of to do it now is because they think removing the fragment would reduce its power in this fight."

"It's definitely a dangerous move." Renet said. "And we're kind of limited on what we can do."

Even though the Giant Superfootbot didn't realize what was happening, it was almost as if it knew it held some sort of advantage as it charged in and slammed into the Turtle Mech. Each of the four had their heads slammed against the back seat as the Turtle Mech fell onto the ground, and then the Giant Superfootbot was on top of it and raised its arm as if to try to smash in the front.

Now trailing up its back, Leo almost lost his hold on his katana and fall downward but Karai used her extended snake arm to wrap around the blue masked turtle's arm and stop him from falling. Leo was glad the kunoichi had the presence of mind to make sure that she didn't use the snake head that served as her hand in that form to stop him or she would have accidently poisoned him. Even Raph slid just a little from the movement but his sais allowed him to get a grip in again before sliding more than a few inches.

"Thanks Karai." Leo said to his older sister as she brought him back to his swords. "I hate to think about how far a fall that is."

"Remind me again why we're taking such a suicidal course of action." Raph joked blandly. He of course knew why well enough. It was his girlfriend in the Turtle Mech after all, though of course it was also Karai's boyfriend in there too. Resolutely the three started to climb again.

"Let's see what he thinks about this." Casey now said as he raised the left arm and shot the grappling hook into the Giant Superfootbot's face. He had to resist the urge to try to send an electrical shock through it as it would hurt Karai and his two turtle friend's more than it would be their foe.

It had the desired effect though as the Giant Superfootbot stopped moving to attack and moved its hand over to grab a hold of the grappling hook and worked to try to pull the weapon off of its face.

"Think you two could use your powers to pull that fragment off of its head?" Renet asked the two psychic enabled girls.

"I doubt it." April answered. "There's no way it's going to stand still long enough to focus our powers."

"How do we get this thing off of us?" Renet asked.

"The only way I know isn't going to work on a robot." April replied.

"And I have to say I'm kind of glad for that one." Casey admitted. He'd already been there the first time he had met Hun and it wasn't pretty.

"Be that as may we need to get up before this thing finishes us off." April said.

"If we work together you and Casey might be able to force this thing off the legs long enough for Renet and I to kick it away." Jennifer proposed. "We're just going to have to hope Raph, Leo and Karai can hold on from the movement."

"Let's do it." April agreed. With that she maneuvered the right arm to clamp onto the Giant Superfootbot's other arm as Casey released the grappling hook grip to and they lifted it up just enough for Jennifer and Renet to take the feet back and deliver a kick to its chest.

They weren't able to see it but luckily this time the three climbers held onto the robot's back as they made their way closer to the neck. Leo couldn't resist craning his neck to check back on his brothers, Aaliyah, and the rest of their friends. He saw that Rocksteady and Bebop had made their way into the fight but were being handled by Slash and Angel respectively.

The four got the Turtle Mech back on its feet even as the Giant Superfootbot was again ready to resume their combat. It reached over and tore a lamp post from where it stood and got ready to use it as a somewhat clumsy, improvisional staff.

"Ah, snap." Renet got out. "What do we do now?"

The Giant Superfootbot swung at the Turtle Mech with the lamp post and sent it flying into a crane, possibly the same one Raph and Jennifer had used against the Cockroach Terminator a few days ago. It left a huge gash and April found her side of the mech not responding as well as it should have.

"Am I the only one thinking this isn't turning out the way we were hoping?" Karai asked her two brothers. "We need another plan."

"How do we have another plan when we're like gnats to this thing?" Raph questioned.

"Karai, get up there and get that second fragment." Leo said to his older sister. Then he looked to Raph. "If we're nothing more than gnats to this thing, then let's get in its face and see what we can do to bug this thing." Both red masked turtle and kunoichi nodded. Karai continued up, now scaling the head as the two turtles started to move to either side of its face.

"That did something." April announced. "I'm having a hard time controlling this side."

Jennifer looked around a bit. "I think it cut into some of the circuitry that connects your arm to the mechanical systems. It looks like if the circuits connect it works, but if they don't then it doesn't get the power it needs to work." She said. She wasn't exactly a mechanical genius but it didn't take much know how to see the wires that should be connected were now waving precariously.

The Giant Superfootbot tried to bring the lamp post down again on them but Casey used the left hand to catch it, and was now trying to wrestle it away from their robotic opponent. "Hey, couldn't Rockwell use his powers to keep those wires together?" Renet asked. "I mean it looks like Mikey and the others have the Footbots, Rocksteady, and Bebop well in hand."

Jennifer pulled out her T-phone and dialed Rockwell. "We got damaged; the wires connecting the right hand of the mech to the system got damaged. April and I are piloting so we can't use our powers to keep them together." She explained.

The mutant monkey nodded. "Ah, I see. It appears our friends have everything in hand, they don't need me here. Give me a couple of minutes to get closer and I'll lend you my aid." Rockwell answered.

"Okay." Jennifer agreed, and then hoped that they could last the couple of minutes.

"Look." April said as she pointed to the Giant Superfootbot. It was getting slightly distracted as it noticed two turtles now in its field of vision. With its free hand it tried to swipe Leo off of him but the blue masked turtle jumped up, ran over the fingers as they would have brushed past him, and then used his katana blades to scratch his way down the face after the attempted brush off had passed.

"Walking the treadmill." Raph joked as he saw Leo did that. Then he stabbed his sais into the Giant Superfootbot's face.

It was further distracted as it felt Karai on its head. She edged her way over the top and started again to crawl toward the fragment.

Rockwell was able to get over and used his psychic powers to hold the wires in place where they needed to be. "I suggest you hurry." He called out.

"Oh, yeah." Renet said. "That's going to be so easy."

"Time to take a page out of that things book then." Casey said. "If you've got the controls back Red, I think it's time to send this one straight back to home."

"I don't think it has a home." Renet noted.

"That's not what he meant." Jennifer said. "I think it's a baseball term."

"And luckily I think I know what Casey meant too." April said as she tried the controls and was gratified to see that they worked. "Renet, Jennifer, get us up." The two girls used their controls to make the Turtle Mech stand up. Casey continued to struggle with taking the lamp post and then April reached out her mech hand got a hold of the lamp post as well.

"What are they trying to do?" Karai wondered.

"Hurry up and get the fragment." Raph called up to his sister. "If I know what they're trying to do we're going to have to make a very quick getaway here."

Karai stretched out one of her snake hands to reach out and grasp the fragment. She found of course it had to be welded on her something but now that she had a grip she could get over to it and use her tonta to get the fragment out of the head. She just hoped she got there before they did whatever they were going to do.

"It's got a good grip." Casey noted. "Of course, considering it's a robot maybe I shouldn't be surprised."

"Let's see what we can do about that then." Renet decided as reared up the left leg of the Turtle Mech and then unleashed a kick as hard as she could do against the arm that was holding the lamp post. It was a lucky stroke that it forced the robot to lose its grip on the lamp post.

"You ever hit any home runs Red?" Casey asked her.

He couldn't see April shake her head. "Not really. But I think we can make this one work anyway." She replied.

Karai managed to dislodge the second fragment from the Giant Superfootbot's head. It was good timing as the Turtle Mech came in for the swing and the lamp post connected solidly with the Giant Superfootbot and sent it flying.

"We're making good frequent flyer miles." Leo noted as he took out his grappling gun. Raph followed suit. The impact did cause Karai to lose her balance but Leo was able to reach out and get a hold of her.

Karai had to take a moment to catch her breath. "Thanks, Leo." She said.

"Anytime." Leo replied.

"Hate to break this up, but we've gotta go." Raph said. With that the two turtles shot their grappling guns out, managing to snag the warehouse where the Giant Superfootbot had come out of just as the large robot hit the waters of the ocean. Whatever had protected the Superfootbots from being taken out by water apparently had not been given to its really big brother because the thing was disable easily as it hit the water, and moments later the mixture of the water and electrical parts caused the thing to explode, getting everyone wet in the process. The wave also sent Raph and Leo off course and the three of them hit the wall of the warehouse hard.

Karai lost her grip on the fragment. "Damn it." She let out. "Someone get it."

Unfortunately it was Rocksteady who managed to get his hands on the fragment just before he and Bebop used the mess left behind by the various Footbot parts to get away from them all.

"That's just great." Mondo said. "All that and those two goons managed to get away with the fragment after all."

"There's always next time." Slash reminded him as they were all getting up.

Leo called April and told them it was time to take the Turtle Mech home, there was nothing more any of them could do now. Leatherhead picked up one of the Superfootbot's for Donnie and Rockwell to examine more thoroughly and the two teams then headed back towards the lair.

Tiger Claw took the second fragment of the eye of sarnath from Steranko and gave it to the Shredder.

"At lease we were able to bring this back." Zeck said.

"A small victory." Shredder replied. "The Giant Footbot is now destroyed and we've lost a great many of the Superfootbot's that Stockman built. I would have much preferred to see those freaks lying bound at my feet and my daughter returned to me."

"He will make more Master." Tiger Claw said. "Zeck and Steranko reported good results from the initial confrontation; they required trickery in order to beat them."

"Have Stockman find a different way to use this fragment for our purposes." Shredder ordered Tiger Claw. "And get on finding the next fragment before the Turtles find it, or even before the Kraang find it."

"Well, it shouldn't take more than about two hours to get the Turtle Mech up and running again." Donnie told the group. "Aside from those wires most of the damage is cosmetic and refueling work."

"You guys did awesome." Raph said as he wrapped Jennifer in his arms and kissed her on the cheek.

The blonde couldn't help but blush a bit, it seemed to her the red masked turtle gave compliments very infrequently. "Thanks Raph." She said.

"Totally." Mikey agreed as Rent sat on his lap. "You guys could have totally been Super Robo Mecha Force."

"There were only four of us." April reminded the orange masked turtle, who shrugged as if it didn't matter how many there were.

"Is there any way to like improve on that thing?" Angel asked them. "Make it more durable or something?" She was sitting on the floor right behind Adelita who had gotten a small space on the couch next to her sister, who was of course in turn next to Leo, her head on his shoulder.

Donnie shrugged. "Honestly I've been trying to think of ways to do that Angel. But the problem is that aside from its power source it's done with current technology. If I had access to some Kraang material that would work with it that might make a difference."

"Do not forget that technology is only a means to an end." Splinter reminded all of his students, even though of course technically Adelita and Angel were not training with him. "It is all of you who must prevail in battle."

"I guess that's true." Adelita agreed as she set her on Angel's shoulder. "You're a good example of that, the armor you're using is nothing without you to control it."

The Latina girl nodded a bit and smiled. "Yeah, guess that's a good point." She conceded.

"We're going to have split our focus here a bit if we want to be prepared." April said.

"I agree." Donnie replied. "April, can you work with the tracker on finding the other fragments?" He asked. She nodded in assent. "Rockwell, you examine that Superfootbot thing, we had more trouble with that than we'd like and we need to be more prepared if…or when more accurately, they show up again. I'll continue examining that Thanosoid thing that seems to have some kind of connection to Bishop and the EDF."

"The rest of you should spend some time honing your skills and preparing for the next confrontation." Splinter said. "Things will only get more intense before things start to settle down again."

"You mean they ever settle down?" Aaliyah asked. "Because it doesn't seem like it."

Who will find the next fragment? Will the team be ready for the next Superfootbots? Who or what is going to come up next? The adventure continues.


	53. New Friends, New Enemies

"That's the second patrol in the last half hour." Mikey whispered to Raph, Jennifer, Karai and Pidgeon Pete as they hid below the rooftops edge as the over a dozen Footbots were running past on the other side. "Do they know where they're going any better than we do?"

"For what it's worth, I don't think so." Raph answered. They had split into a few different teams to start a manual search for the next fragment for the eye of sarnath. Donnie, April, and Rockwell had stayed at the lair to work on the multiple projects that had to worry about. Along with them of course were Splinter, Renet and Adelita.

Leo, Mondo, Aaliyah and Candy were also on patrol as a team. Rounding out the patrol teams was Slash, Leatherhead, Casey and Angel. The Latina girl had been a bit reluctant as she was not used to having to work with so many people but she had reluctantly gone along with it. All four teams were keeping in contact with each other and the lair aka home base via the T-phones.

"Too bad they can have more teams out on the streets than we can." Jennifer said softly. "Their odds of stumbling upon it are much better than ours."

"At least it's only Footbots." Pete noted. "None of those mutant minions that Shredder has don't seem to be out."

"So far." Karai reminded him firmly. "That could change very quickly."

The five of them continued on their patrol and saw the three Purple Dragon goons Tsoi, Fong and Sid hassling an old man for his money. "We should stop that, right Raph?" Mikey asked his older brother.

Raph gritted his teeth. Letting something like this pass was basically against every fiber of his being but at the same they did technically have larger problems to worry about. Namely finding the fragment. "I…" He started.

Karai too was agitated. Given how she was raised by Shredder, helping others was not a second nature to her. That was something she was working very hard to rectify and this was a good example of what she should now be willing to stop.

Then they saw a blur of motion and something landed in the alley behind the mugging and they heard a voice call out, "That's enough." They turned to darkness. "Let him go."

"Why should we listen to you?" Sid asked.

Fong looked uncertain. Usually from the shadows came a garbage mutant, turtle mutants, other assorted mutants and even lately the armored vigilante. "Maybe we should just…"

"I'm not running from these things anymore." Sid snapped.

"I agree." Tsoi now spoke up. "No more running from these freaks."

"Three on one, huh?" The voice asked. "Then just bring it." Then from out of the shadows, so fast it was hard to see, the figure rammed right into the stomach of Tsoi, flipping him over at least once before he landed hard. They now saw a female mutant bird, her hands on her hips as she looked on amused. Jennifer was able to recognize the markings as that of a hawk.

"See, told you it was another freak." Fong said. "Let's just get out of here already."

"Not yet. Never give up, never surrender." She stated and jumped up before performing something very similar to a frog splash onto Fong. Then she turned to Sid. "Time to lock up bucko."

Sid looked at her like was kind of crazy, and Raph was wondering the same thing though he had to grant she had taken out two of the three dragon's single handedly. Of course as Mikey pointed out the dragons were like clearing a video game on easy.

The remaining dragon charged right at her and she met him, locking her wings with the talons on the end that were like hands with his and they seemed locked for a moment as if it were some kind of test of strength.

"This bird is nuts." Raph remarked.

"She must think this is a game." Karai added dryly with a roll of her eyes.

"That bird is so neat." Pidgeon Pete said. "And pretty too."

She then moved quickly and was behind him, wrapping her arms around his waist before flipping him over her and releasing him where he hit the ground hard. Mikey quickly identified that as a suplex.

"What does she think this is?" Raph asked. "A wrestling ring."

"She's winning." Jennifer reminded her boyfriend simply.

"Yeah, true." The red masked turtle grudgingly admitted.

Karai thought about each of their individual fighting styles despite everything. "I guess as long as she's winning then it doesn't really matter how she fights." She relented as well.

The female hawk mutant waited to see what Sid would do and as a result was grabbed from behind by Fong. She slammed her head backward and collided with his face, and as he released her the hawk girl lifted him up onto her shoulder and then dropped him on top of Sid.

"Talk about an attitude adjustment." Mikey said with a laugh.

It was then Hun appeared from the shadows and kicked her hard in the stomach. It sent her flying into a trash can. "Nice moves, bird." Hun said. "But this isn't a ring."

"I think it's time to jump in." Jennifer said to Raph.

He nodded. "Let's do it." He agreed. As the hawk girl was getting up the three of them flew across the two rooftops as Pidgeon Pete flew the way and then all five of them landed in front of Hun. "Not so fast."

Hun took a step back. "Ah, where one freak is more are not far behind." The dragon leader commented. He saw that Tsoi had now joined Sid and Fong, who were getting up gingerly. "We'll deal with all you later." And with that remark the dragon's fled.

Then Pete, Jennifer, Karai and the two turtles turned to the newest mutant to show up on the scene.

"This is almost so romantic." Candy said to Aaliyah as the two of them roof jumped with Leo. Mondo chose to skateboard across the roof instead. "It's almost like we're on a double date."

Aaliyah laughed, the ends of her white bandana flowing behind her. "Yeah, so romantic." The female turtle said amused. "I mean we are searching for a jewel fragment too. Of course we may very well have to kick some major butt to get it, which could lessen the romantic appeal."

"That depends on your definition of romance." Leo reminded his girlfriend as he ran on her other side with the ends of his blue bandana flowing behind him.

They quickly ducked behind a small shed structure as they heard the approach of Footbots. "Looks like we're not the only ones trying to find this shiny little trinket." Mondo noted. "I just hope they're as clueless as the rest of us are."

"I sure hope so." Aaliyah said. "They already have one of the fragments and we don't even know for sure how many there are out there."

"Are we even sure what do with them?" Mondo asked them. "I mean just because that armor Angel has has places for the fragments, does that really mean we should be giving them to her?"

"Are you saying you don't trust Angel?" Aaliyah asked back.

Mondo shook his head. "Nah, nothing like that." He responded. "But when it comes down to it Angel don't even know much about that armor. What if by putting the fragments in it we end up having it take over her something."

"I think you've been watching too much science fiction stuff." Leo said to him. Aaliyah found the statement a bit ironic considering how much he watched Space Heroes. Granted she was a fan too but she wasn't the one who said another person was watching too much of the type.

"Look, we're just collecting them now." Aaliyah reminded them. "We're not going to do anything else with them until Donnie and Rockwell have had the chance to study it all further."

"They're gone." Leo reported. "Let's move out." The four of them went on their way.

Slash led the group and Leatherhead brought up the rear. In between them was Casey and Angel. The Latina girl had chosen not to activate the Nightwatcher armor as she called it until they actually needed to use it. It the meantime she had her black, purple streaked hair flying behind her, except one strand which seemed to insist on getting into her eyes, which made Casey laugh hard enough to hear it even though they were running, or skating in Casey's case, and through his mask.

"I got to remember to tie it up in a ponytail or something next time." Angel muttered to herself.

Slash came to a halt and held up his hands. "Hang on." He announced.

"What's up? More foot?" Casey asked as they skidded to a stop. They were all aware of the chances of running into the Foot as they were searching for the fragments too. They were also aware of the chance of running into Kraang too.

That was not what stopped Slash however. "No, it's some of those goons that were there when Bishop took Aaliyah and the guy's hostage in the sub labs." He answered.

Angel came to his side and took a look. "Almost militaristic in their movements." She noted softly. "But something is off about them."

"What do you mean?" Casey asked.

"I had noticed that too." Leatherhead replied. "They possess reflexes similar to soldiers but at the same time they seem to be more…slow witted for lack of a better term."

"Almost like they were zombies or possessed or something." Angel voiced. "I mentioned something about that to Donnie before we came out and he was going to try to look into it but between those Superfootbot's, the Thanosoids, and tracking any sarnath fragments I don't know if anyone is going to get to that."

"Whatever they are, they're going about pretty easily." Slash noted. "I can see their firearms on them even from here but something tells me the average citizen isn't going to see that."

"They're still creepy." Angel observed. "Even if I didn't know they were packing heat I'd still be wary of them. Kind of reminds me of a little gang group that would be looking for trouble, and I don't mean the dragon types either."

"I just hope they're as clueless as we are." Slash noted. "We don't even have a general direction down."

"Hello." Jennifer said as she cautiously stepped toward the hawk girl. "That was some impressive moves you did. I'm Jennifer Quinn and these are my friend Michelangelo and Pidgeon Pete and my boyfriend Raphael."

"Hey." The hawk girl said a bit uncertainly. The fear of people was still kind of ingrained in her. Granted three of them were mutant people rather than human people but the flight instinct was still there. She however couldn't keep the pride out of her voice as she said. "Those were wrestling moves that I've seen on TV."

"That was so cool." Mikey said. "Giving the attitude adjustment to Fong and making him land on Sid."

"How are you here?" Pidge Pete asked her. "I mean where did you come from?"

"It started about two years ago." She answered, and Raph and Mikey flinched just a little. Just like Mondo she was a mutant that had been created when the Kraang were trying to deliver mutagen to Shredder. The turtles had intercepted the stealth ship but a huge mishap had caused dozens of mutagen canisters to escape, also causing April's dad to temporarily mutate as well. "I was sitting on a telephone wire watching Smackdown through a window when all of a sudden this canister falls from the sky and smacks me in the head and back. I fall to the ground hard and the next thing you know I'm standing up on my legs and my wings feel like they're made of something like actual bone."

"How'd you learn how to talk?" Karai asked her.

"I started learning to hide, though I had to change my places since I was bigger than before." The hawk girl answered. "That's when I would hear snippets of conversation and I found other places to get my wrestling fixes, which is always full of talk."

"Yeah, especially smack talk." Mikey said.

"But what is your name?" Pidgeon Pete asked.

She shrugged. "Don't have one." She admitted.

"Then this is your lucky day, I am the master of names." Mikey said, causing Raph to groan and slapping his hand against his face and Karai to laugh a bit exasperatedly. He looked at her. "You're a hawk, and you like wrestling, even got some sick moves of your own…" The orange masked turtle murmured. He then reached behind her and found a dark purple shirt that had been discarded for whatever reason as it seemed neat enough. He used a shuriken to cut it up and make a mask that he tied over her face so that it covered her from the beak up except for her eyes. "There, I christen you Hawlita, named after one of the most excellent female wrestlers in history."

"Oh brother." Raph sighed.

"I think that's great." Pidgeon Pete volunteered.

She however laughed. "Hawlita…I like it." She said. "You are good at this."

"It's what I do." Mikey agreed with a laugh. He had named Leatherhead as well, as well as many other bad guys they had faced with a few exceptions.

Donnie glanced around at the computer he had set up as he was going through some of the information scrolling on the screen. "I can't help but wonder where this polyzerkonium stuff came from." He murmured to himself. "It's not in the stuff Renet brought back."

"Probably for good reason." Adelita reminded him gently as she poured him some coffee. She had taken to making sure their 'techies' were set up for their endeavor. In truth she wasn't sure she could do much else to help right now. "What if that information fell under the hands of someone less responsible than us?"

"She has a good point." Rockwell agreed. "What if someone like Falco got his hands on that stuff after all?"

April was working the tracking app on her laptop for the third fragment when something caught her eye on the screen, an energy signature. It had been almost two months since they'd seen it but she hadn't forgotten it. "Donnie, I'm detecting something. A portal just opened." She announced.

"Portal?" Renet questioned.

"Yeah." April answered. "The kind of portal energy that was present when that large guardian like thing that Mikey and Casey fought in Central Park."

"Does that mean that Fulcanelli is back?" Donnie wondered. He shook his head. "It doesn't matter; we have to get out there. Contact the parties and have them get there and we'll meet them."

April moved to do just that and then cursed softly. "Slash, Angel, Casey and Leatherhead are already there." She said. The others got up quickly after hearing that. They knew the demons were nothing to trifle with. Renet even volunteered to open up a portal to get them there quicker.

"Be careful guys." Adelita said as the door closed.

As Angel and her teammates followed the EDF guys she was starting to think they were not looking for the fragment but none of them were sure what they were doing. If she didn't know any better she swore it was a search pattern of some sort, but not the kind of thing one would expect from an inanimate fragment piece.

"It is like they are searching for something." Leatherhead noted.

"Us maybe?" Casey wondered.

"Somehow I doubt that one." Slash said. "Bishop seems to have done enough studying about the turtles to know the streets aren't the best place to be looking."

There was a brief but bright flash and the four of them had to cover their eyes. "What the hell was that, a freaking flash bomb?" Angel asked.

"I think it's worse." Casey told the girl. "Last time I saw something like that was when Mikey, Rockwell and I sent a large demon thing running in Central Park."

"Right that Guardian thing while the rest of us were dealing with those Hell Hunters and that psycho Hector." Slash recalled with some annoyance. He had been there when the newly mutated shifter got the drop on Raphael and tossing him off the stadium roof.

The light and presumably the portal faded away and the last thing the four of them were expecting was what looked to be a slim Asian woman dressed in what looked to be samurai armor but it was in no way the kind of armor one would expect, more like a second layer of skin.

"What the heck?" Casey asked. "What are we missing here?"

Something about this woman set them all on edge. She watched as the soldier's approached her. "I don't know who's creepier man." Angel mused. "This woman or the soldier's."

"A welcoming committee I see." The woman noted. She had a rather deep and throaty voice. Angel almost got the somewhat contradictory impression of seductive and yet no nonsense. She wasn't even sure that was possible and yet it seemed they were looking at it. "Rather appreciated but completely unnecessary."

The soldier's simply raised their weapons and aimed. They made no further moves, not even to talk. That in itself was unusual as if they expected her to understand what they wanted.

The thing was she seemed to. "I'll indeed have a talk with your bosses." She said. "In my own time." Then with that she brought her hands out and then like lightning she moved and before any of the four knew how to react she had rushed past the soldiers, and moments later each of them lost their heads as they fell to the ground. Blood glistened off of long fingernails.

"Man that is harsh." Casey said.

"What the hell is she?" Angel asked.

"She must be a demon." Slash answered. "Though more human looking than any demon I've ever seen."

Then the woman seemed to glance around and was then gone. "What the hell just happened?" Angel asked as Casey added, "Damn, that was bizarre."

Then from behind them; "It's not polite to spy, or to curse. Particularly from a lady." They turned to find themselves only inches away from the same woman. She had her hands folded seemingly delicately over her chest as she gazed at them amused.

Each of them went on their guards and the woman laughed. "If I wanted you two humans and you two wondrous creatures dead then you wouldn't be standing here right now." She reprimanded.

"Don't sell any of them short or us for that matter." She glanced out of the corner of her eye and saw Donnie, April, Rockwell and Renet there.

"There's more than meets the eye." She heard and glanced to the other side as well where Leo, Aaliyah, Candy and Mondo Gecko landed.

"There are some very interesting beings in this world now." The woman noted amusingly. "Very powerful beings." She added as she glanced over at April. "Powerful artifacts." She looked now to the time scepter and Renet kind of took a step back, closer to the red head who in turn moved to protect the apprentice time mistress and more importantly the scepter.

"Where did you come from anyway?" Rockwell asked her.

It was Angel who answered him. "This is what came out of that weird portal thing."

The woman seemed to harrumph. "Quite a rude little girl aren't you?" She questioned Angel haughtily. "Are all children so ill-mannered when addressing a woman, not to mention an elder, as you are?"

"I'm not sure I question that you're older than us." Slash now said. "But you're not a woman. You're a demon. If how you showed up here isn't proof enough, decapitating those soldiers with your nails is proof enough?"

"She killed soldiers?" Aaliyah asked, sounding slightly horrified.

"Perish the thought." The woman said dismissively. "I killed undead soldiers. For the ones responsible for their actual death, you're going to have to look elsewhere for that."

It was still slightly disturbing to know that someone out there had killed men to make at least one platoon, and everyone would have put their money on Bishop, his scientist guy or his sergeant.

"If you'll excuse me, I'll be on my way." She announced.

"We can't let her walk away." Casey said. "She's still a dangerous thi…pers…individual."

"I'm afraid he has a point." Leo agreed. "You did show up from a portal we know releases dangerous demons, we can't let you be alone in this town. But we're more than willing to act as guides as you acclimate to this city."

The woman seemed to be looking at Leo as if she were considering his offer, but in a matter of seconds it went from contemplative to scornful. "You really think I need insolent freaks and spoiled brats to find my way?" She asked. "Apparently the little girl over there isn't the only one who needs an attitude adjustment."

Before any of the three teams could react her sharp nails were out and she headed toward Leo as if she were going to decapitate him as well but then Karai was in front of the blue masked turtle blocking her slash attack with her tonta followed very quickly by a jump kick from Raph to knock her away from them.

Right with them were Jennifer, Mikey, Pidgeon Pete and a hawk girl that they didn't recognize, though both Donnie and Leo were sure the mask had to be their orange masked younger brother's idea. Meanwhile it didn't escape Angel, April, Aaliyah or Candy's notice that the Pidgeon mutant seemed enamored with their newest arrival.

"You wretched little beasts!" The woman now snarled as she rose. They could now almost see a fox like appearance superimpose itself over the Asian woman she was looking like. "I am Kitsune, the Vulpes Stregheria. No one disrespects me like this."

Renet was afraid of this. She wasn't supposed to be here either, and that was a really bad thing. She wasn't sure the team was ready for this.

Kitsune waved her hands and a couple of white ninja appeared out of nowhere, which was kind of a shock since originally only Chein Khan had been able to do that one. Each of the white ninja moved in to attack and were immediately intercepted by Slash and Leo and they started to clash.

Angel twisted the bracelet to activate the Nightwatcher armor, which was timed really well because Kitsune moved again with that speed and tried to decapitate her, something only the armor prevented though it did send her sprawling straight on her back. She had to dodge to avoid a fist to the face though she wasn't sure what that would do.

"Guess you rubbed a sore spot." Casey said as he moved up and tried to smack Kitsune with a hockey stick only for her to dodge that, followed almost immediately by the snap of Leatherhead's jaw. Then Pidgeon Pete tried to dive bomb her, more to impress Hawlita more than anything else, but she grabbed him by the beak and slammed him on the ground hard.

Hawlita moved in, brought her legs out and hooked them around Kitsune's and then turned her legs to bring the mystery opponent down on her feet. Kitsune recovered very quickly but by that time Leo and Slash had dealt with the white ninjas and the others were getting closer to helping their friends.

Kitsune let out a laugh though it wasn't even close to amused. "Perhaps I've gone about this the wrong way." She decided. "I'll bow out of this one, but we're not done here." Then in a puff of smoke she was gone.

"Why didn't she just do that before hand?" Angel demanded to know.

"She was testing us." Karai answered. "She wanted to get an idea of what we're capable of doing."

"I think she succeeded." Raph noted. "Just great. Another psycho around here."

"Speaking of another." Casey said as he looked to the hawk girl. "Who's the new mutant?"

"I have graced her with the name Hawlita." Mikey said with an exaggerated bow.

Casey shook his head. "Wow, first a female turtle and now a female bird." He said. "Totally metal."

Karai laughed. "You and your weird sayings." She said as she leaned her arm on his shoulder.

"That didn't go so well though." Angel noted. "We tried to find another fragment and got ourselves some psycho demon lady instead."

"Is what she said true?" Aaliyah wondered. "Did someone kill army guys to make their own zombie like minions?"

Jennifer sighed. "I wouldn't rule it out." She answered softly. "My father made some comments that made me think the demon's he served thought it was the next logical step." She looked around at her friends. "If somehow Bishop is working with anything associated with my father then we have major problems ahead of us."

Kitsune watched the group from a distance. It was odd to her to see a group composed of so many mutants. The world had changed and she decided it was time to change with it.

A/N: Kitsune is based off of the original idw TMNT comic series, just with my own take. I wanted her to be more villainous than she has appeared in the comic series.

What plans does Kitsune have? What is her connection to the demons that Fulcanelli commanded? Are they connected to Bishop and his employers? Where is the next fragment? The adventure continues.


	54. The Past Returns

"So I guess the Mutanimals keep growing." Raph said as he ran the rooftops with Leo, Aaliyah, Karai, Casey and his girlfriend Jennifer. "The Mutanimals are taking the night off of to get Hawlita set up in their lair."

"They're growing just like you guys are." Jennifer said with a small smile. "Though I guess they're growing a bit more."

"Yeah, I guess you got a point there." Raph agreed.

"Sometimes that's a good thing." Karai said. She wasn't sure when it happened but she was finding it hard not to find herself getting fond of her brothers and their girlfriends. Add Casey on top of that, as well as the Mutanimals and their new friends Adelita and Angel, and it was becoming a full house. "It sounds weird but I'm finding it a little harder every day to be so…detached from all of you."

"Score." Casey laughed. "We're growing on you. It's that pea pod that Mikey put under your mattress. You fell asleep, and that's when we get you."

Karai looked at him blankly. Jennifer did as well and then the kunoichi said to the blonde, "And then sometimes it's a good thing that some of us don't know what some others are talking about." That elicited a small giggle from the lithe blonde.

They had just landed on another rooftop when several laser blasts caused all of them to have to scatter backwards. They saw Tiger Claw land on the rooftop, accompanied by Hector and Rahzar. "Well, we went looking for a fragment but found some reptiles."

"And a pretty little girl." Hector added with a leer at Jennifer that made her shrink back a little and actually seemed to piss of Karai.

"What the hell am I, chopped liver?" Casey asked.

"Like that's a compliment." Raph reminded his friend.

"We're going to put you out of our misery, once and for all." Tiger Claw vowed.

Meanwhile Mikey, Donnie, April and Renet were following a signal that had come up, one that could possibly be a fragment of the eye of sarnath. They decided to make sure what they were really finding before calling the others together.

"You really sure you want me around for this?" Renet asked them. "I mean I'm not really a fighter."

"You're not defenseless either." April reminded the apprentice time mistress. "You've proven that time and again. You're still the only one to have ever deflected that black burn thing that Fulcanelli tried to use."

"Too which I am still eternally grateful for." Mikey added. Renet had to giggle at the huge grin on his face.

"Try to keep it down." Donnie said to them. "Remember we don't know what we're going to be running into down here."

They had gotten a few more feet down the tunnel, which both Donnie and April recognized was pretty close to not only the location where the Kraang had been bringing in Kraathatrogon's onto Earth but also where they had their first confrontation with Rat King's rat mutants. Mikey shook his head. "I think my brain must be fried, I'm hearing this buzzing sound." He said.

Donnie thought it was probably a good thing Raph wasn't here to capitalize on their younger brother's words. Then he realized that Mikey was right, they could hear buzzing. And it somehow sounded familiar.

April thought so too. "That sounds like wasps…uh oh." She started and as they turned the corner to see Parasiticaqueen in that area now. She seemed to be nursing a dozen wasp eggs. "Not again." The red head sighed.

"How is she doing that?" Donnie wondered. "She shouldn't be able to nurse those eggs; they'd eat her upon hatching." He remembered that she had worked with another mutant named Snake Eyes to take control over the adults of New York to tend her eggs and be their meal upon awakening. He didn't see the cobra mutant though.

"I think that's how." Renet interrupted quietly as she pointed to the corner, where there was a small generator that used to be what opened up the Kraang portal. Donnie couldn't be sure how but wires were connected between the eggs and the generator. And powering the generator was none other than a fragment to the eye of sarnath.

"We have to get that away from her." April said. "Hopefully before those eggs hatch."

"Agreed." Donnie said. He glanced around for a moment. "Okay, April and I will try to make out way stealthily to the generator and take out the eye of sarnath." He looked to Renet and Mikey. "You two stay here. Get ready to attack when we get that fragment or if we somehow screw up the stealth maneuvers."

"You got it dude." Mikey said. He watched as his purple masked brother and their first human friend then started to sneak to some debris and toward the generator. So far Parasiticaqueen seemed oblivious but the orange masked turtle was smart enough to know how quickly that could change.

Tiger Claw landed and drew two swords, a katana and a short sword before charging at Leo and Raph. Both turtles drew their weapons and blocked the tiger assassin's strike. Facing off against the mutant tiger was not Raph's favorite idea if Hector was around to threaten his girl though.

Rahzar dashed at Casey and Aaliyah and tried to take off both of their heads, but the vigilante and female turtle managed to duck and roll under the attack. Both of them turned to face down the double mutated dog man. "Always wanted to fight a zombie wolf." Casey remarked.

That did unfortunately leave Jennifer to face off against Hector. As much as her fighting skills had improved she still found she couldn't shake the fear that seeing the man who had tormented and abused her for years always brought to the surface. She took out her batons and got ready to try to fight.

Hector laughed as he shifted into a large mantis like creature. "Such nice little toys, sweet girl." He said lustily. "I know exactly what to do with those." The blonde shuddered in fear at his comment.

"She's not the only one you have to contend with." Karai said as she jumped in front of Jennifer with her tonta raised. That lasted only a moment before she leapt up and kicked the shifting mutant straight in the chest. The kunoichi thought she heard a couple of his ribs crack and found some comfort in that.

"If I bring you back to Shredder I'll get a huge reward." Hector laughed. "I just hope he doesn't mind if you're missing a few pieces."

Karai laughed at him too. "You think you have what it takes to take some of my pieces, feel free to try." She taunted him. He tried to use the scythe arm to chop her in half but the kunoichi dodged the attack easily.

Jennifer followed through by bringing one of her batons straight down on his face. Rather his nose broke from the impact or not was hard to say but some blood did come from his nostrils. He looked at her furiously. "You have some nerve to hit me, you stupid little sl…" He started to yell.

Karai came right down and delivered a kick across his jaw. "You watch what you say to my friend…brother's girlfriend." She responded. Jennifer never the less caught Karai's original statement and felt some pride in that.

Raph felt a bit better knowing that Karai had his blonde girlfriend's back. That made it easier for him to minimize the trouble that he and his older brother were having with Tiger Claw. The fact they hadn't lost their weapons while fighting the tiger assassin was a pyrrhic victory in itself.

Casey and Aaliyah were having an easy time dodging Rahzar's attacks but attacking him was proving a bit difficult. The female turtle got a good snap kick to the mutant's jaw but he only roared at her in frustration.

Hector lashed out at Karai and she blocked it with her tonta. She then brought her knee up straight into his face. Jennifer swung her leg out and against his ankles to bring her former tormentor down onto his back. As Karai moved in to try to bring her weapon down on into his chest he shifted into a large snake and slithered away for a moment before taking his seemingly preferred mantis form.

Tiger Claw shot his ice laser and struck Raph in the chest hard. The red masked turtle fell to the ground and had some ice form on his chest. "One turtle down." Tiger Claw gloated.

"We'll see about that you overgrown fur ball." Raph growled even as he started to chip at the ice with his sais.

With that Tiger Claw turned his attention to Leo. "Just you and me now, reptile." He said.

Leo got his katana ready for combat. "Let's go then Tiger Claw."

Donnie and April easily found their way to the generator. Donnie looked at the hookups. "Should be easy enough to disconnect the fragment from the generator." Donnie whispered softly. "The challenge will be getting out of here once we get it."

"We'll have to cross that bridge when we…" April started but even as she heard Mikey yell out a warning she felt a sharp pain in her left shoulder. She looked to see the stinger from Parasiticaqueen sticking out of her left shoulder, which was followed by her scream of pain. The mutant wasp lifted her up a little before tossing her hard toward one of the walls, but Renet was there to barely catch her though they both hit the ground hard.

"April!" Donnie gasped and glared at the wasp mutant. "I am going to make you pay for that!"

"I owe you, you and your brood." Parasiticaqueen hissed. "You destroyed my children."

"Before they could eat the people of New York." Mikey said as he smacked her with his nunchuck. "Who's really the bad guy here?" In response she tried to stab the orange masked turtle but he dodged it.

"April." Renet said. "Hold on." She wanted to ask how she was but thought that was kind of a stupid question.

"I'll be okay." April said to her, though she flinched as she tried to move. "We need…need to staunch the bleeding."

For a moment Renet wished she had Jennifer's healing powers. She did however know what to do as she took off her cape, the one concession she made to her otherwise normal outfit while in the 21st century with her friends and started to apply pressure to the wound to stop the bleeding. "I wish I knew if she had hit a major artery." Renet said softly.

Donnie tried to attack Parasiticaqueen with his staff but she dodged out of the way of the attack. She then tried to shoot her stinger at the purple masked turtle but he blocked it with his bo staff and shook it off. He was annoyed, though slightly curious, to see the stinger grow back.

Mikey turned his nunchuck into the kusarigama chain and tried to wrap it around the mutant wasp, which would be bigger than the drones of her species, and tried to enrapture her but she dodged that one too. "Is that the best you can do?" She taunted.

"We got to try to get some help." April said as she reached for her T-phone, thankfully in her right pocket. She was disturbed though to see that for whatever reason their signal was being blocked. With a sigh she took a deep breath and reached out to deliver her call for help a different way.

Aaliyah was not thrilled to see that Leo was now dealing with Tiger Claw on his own. That distraction cost her though as Rahzar lashed out with his large paw and it slammed into her chest hard. She went flying and crashed onto the ground hard. Casey swung his hockey stick at the mutant dog and he caught the attack mid swing and then slammed the vigilante down hard on Aaliyah, knocking the breath out of both of them.

Hector changed his 'hands' into large crab like claws and shot them at Karai and they both struck into her shoulders, knocking her to the ground as well. Jennifer tried to rush over to help her get free and Hector lashed out and slammed the back of his hand brutally against the blonde's chest, and the only thing that stopped her from flying backwards was because he grabbed her by her arm and lifted her up. "Let's see what kind of fun I can get away with right now." He said leeringly.

Leo saw all of this but was not in a position to do anything about it; it was taking everything he had to evade Tiger Claw. Then he saw movement from the rooftop. In what was practically a blur Hector was tripped up. He lost his grip on Jennifer and she was able to use the momentum to somersault over to Karai and finish helping the kunoichi, who had used her snake form to work around the claws.

Then in with another speedy blur Rahzar was kicked back hard and then the figure moved on as Aaliyah and Casey were ready for the next round. The final one came when the figure actually landed a hit on Tiger Claw, and a quick slash which destroyed the short sword the mutant assassin was using. The figure then landed by Leo and the blue masked turtle was shocked at what stood before him.

Their savior was the same size as the turtles, but he was a white rabbit. He wore blue cloth that vaguely resembled the top of a robe and loose black pants. He held a sword in one hand while another remained sheathed. He and Leo exchanged nods and then went over and pulled Raph free of the ice.

Tiger Claw growled. "Miyamoto Usagi." He glared hatefully at the rabbit.

"You thought you could run from me Tiger Claw." The rabbit, Usagi, commented as he glared at the mutant assassin. "I swore that you would pay for what you did."

"Wait a minute." Karai said as she smirked. "You're telling me a ninja rabbit took your tail?" She questioned her former superior.

"I think he's a samurai." Jennifer corrected the kunoichi.

Karai laughed again. "Sure, fine. The point is the big bad mutant tiger had his tail chopped off by a rabbit." She mocked, drawing Tiger Claw's ire for just a moment before he focused again on Usagi.

"If you think you can do better than you did last time, then take your best shot." Tiger Claw said as he glared at the rabbit warrior.

Usagi ran over and the two of them clashed their weapons and then Tiger Claw tried to sweep his legs out from under him but he jumped up. He tried to kick Tiger Claw but the assassin caught him and tossed him hard. Leo and Raph came in from behind and both landed on him though he easily tossed the two mutant turtles off.

Karai looked to Aaliyah. "Hey, time to switch it up." She called out.

Aaliyah nodded. She raced over and slammed her elbow right into Hector's stomach even as Karai used her natural speed to rush over to Rahzar and brought her knee into his gut before tossing him right to Casey who used the hockey stick to smack the mutant dog in the face and right off the roof. They heard him land in an open dumpster.

Hector tried to swipe at Aaliyah but she blocked it with her bunrei's and then delivered a hard frontal kick to his jaw. Jennifer moved in and slammed one of her batons into his stomach and then the other again against his head. Then before the shifter could respond back at either the female turtle or his obsession Casey was skating right into his line of sight and slapped him with his hockey stick and he too fell off the roof.

With that they were all ready to deal with Tiger Claw if needed but the contest between the mutant tiger assassin and what everyone assumed was a mutant rabbit samurai was very interesting, much like seeing Aaliyah and Leo spar but with a potentially deadlier outcome.

Jennifer cocked her head, swearing she heard April in her mind saying something about being in trouble at the portal locale. "Leo, Raph. April and the others are in trouble." She said. "Where you guys fought Rat King's minions."

"We have to go." Raph said.

"We can't leave Usagi." Leo countered.

Usagi overheard the conversations going among the people he had helped save. He had also heard the blonde mention that others were in trouble. Being one who always tried to help those in need, he knew that had to come before his desire to redeem himself. "If we must go, then we must go." He said.

The three turtles nodded and each of them tossed smoke bombs. As the smoke cleared Aaliyah grabbed Usagi's hand and helped to guide them off the roof and to the nearest manhole cover as the smoke cleared and left Tiger Claw growling in annoyance that changed into a roar of frustration.

"Would you stand still?" Mikey demanded as he tried to smash the chain into Parasiticaqueen but she didn't listen as she dodged out of the way. She then tried to stab Mikey as she had April but the orange masked turtle wasn't being ambushed and was able to dodge it.

"Donnie." April called out, ignoring the pain in her shoulder. "The eggs are starting to move."

"Ah, sewer apples." Donnie murmured and then used his bo staff like a baseball bat to slap the fragment out of the generator. It went flying across the tunnel. No one was currently in a position to get their hands on it.

To make matters worse April's warning and Donnie's actions were too little too late as several of the wasp eggs had hatched. "Double sewer apples." Mikey said.

"My children are here, and now the four of you will suffer." Parasiticaqueen gloated eagerly as she had almost a dozen wasps floating around her now.

Donnie and Mikey quickly took a defensive stance around April and Renet. To both girls' credits Renet got up and prepared to help with her time scepter and even April got one of her tessen ready with her non injured arm to help out.

"Finish them off!" Parasiticaqueen commanded her drones and they all rushed forward, seemingly eager to plunge their stingers into the four of them.

So focused were the wasp drones on that they weren't paying attention when Leo, Raph, Aaliyah and Karai attacked one each directly. Casey smacked one with an explosive hockey puck and Jennifer tossed one of her bladed batons at another one. The final strike came from their new ally Usagi, who took out another one as the ninjas had. That left four plus the queen as they approached their brothers.

"Hey, it's a new mutant." Mikey said as he smiled at Usagi happily. "How does Cottontail sound to you?"

Usagi seemed confused as if he wasn't sure what the orange masked turtle was talking about. "You may call me Miyamoto Usagi." He told the four new allies.

"You think my children will have a problem feasting on rabbit any more than they do turtles or humans?" Parasiticaqueen asked with a laugh.

"Let's go ninja on these." Leo suggested as he withdrew a smoke bomb. He tossed it to the ground and as the area clouded over Leo and Aaliyah took out one. Raph and Jennifer took out another. Donnie and Mikey took out a third one, Usagi and Karai finished up the last drone.

The smoke cleared and Parasiticaqueen was not happy. "You've taken out my children. I promise you will pay for this." She declared before floating up rapidly and shooting several stingers that caused a rock slide, not enough to hurt anyone but distracting enough to get away, right before she grabbed the fragment of the eye of sarnath she was using.

After the dust settled Donnie ran over where he thought he saw the fragment and then when he saw there was nothing there he groaned. "Parasiticaqueen must have gotten it before she got away."

"Got what?" Raph asked his purple masked brother.

"A sarnath fragment." Donnie sighed. He then went over and lifted April up into his arms. "But we can worry about that later, right now we need to get April to the lair so I can clean and check her wound before Jennifer heals her up."

Angel was helping Adelita make dinner; they had made beef and chicken enchiladas. It was kind of nice for them to be able to talk without interruptions from the boys and even to a lesser extent Aaliyah. Though Adelita was glad to be on very good terms with her little sister again there was still a huge gulf that needed to be filled, if it could be at all.

"So do you cook often?" Adelita asked her as she rolled the now filled tortilla shell.

Angel shook her head. "Nah." She answered simply. "Not normally but when I was growing up I helped my Abuelita…my grandmother in the kitchen of her small restaurant." She was taking some out of the oven. With the big group they had dinner wasn't exactly a quick task.

"What about your parents?" Adelita asked her.

Angel sighed a bit. "I…never really knew them." She admitted. "My dad left us when I was very young and my mom was an addict. She was in and out of rehabs for most of my life. That's one of the reasons I helped my Abuelita in the kitchen."

"I'm sorry." Adelita said as she reached out and gently placed her hand on her shoulder. "I had some equality issues with my parents but I know they loved me and Aaliyah dearly. Even the turtles have Splinter who loves them like a true father, it's too bad you didn't exactly have that."

Angel shrugged it off. "Not that I don't appreciate the sentiment Adelita but I think about the times with my Abuelita and honestly I don't feel cheated or that I missed out on something or anything like that." She replied.

Adelita giggled a little. "I'm glad to hear that. You made the best of what you had and you don't feel sorry about it." She sighed just a bit. "Actually in that way you're smarter than I ever was. Then maybe I wouldn't have to make up so much where Aaliyah is concerned."

"Don't beat yourself up over it." Angel told her friend. "Everyone is different and that's no one's fault. Just because one person handles a similar situation one way doesn't mean that another handles it the exact same way."

"You didn't have to stay with me." Adelita pointed out softly. "I mean I know you rather like being out there and beating down the bad guys and all."

Angel laughed softly. "True, but everyone needs to take a little time off. And I like spending time with you. It's a nice change of pace from the other fighters that are around here, much as I can see on their level." She responded. She sighed a bit. "Besides Donnie thought it best I hang back until they can determine what the best idea is to do with my armor and the fragments."

They heard commotion and they assumed their team was back. Then they both looked at each other uncertainly as they heard Donnie say, "Leo, run into the lab and get me the first aid kit." Adelita's thoughts went to the idea that Aaliyah had been injured.

Her fear only abated slightly when they heard Aaliyah say, "Couch is clear Donnie." That only said to her that while her sister was okay someone else was not. Both girls came out of the kitchen to see Donnie lying April on the couch. She was still conscious and aside from the huge wound on her shoulder she seemed fine.

"I'm going to go get her a new shirt." Jennifer said and then dashed off toward her room.

April understood as she let Donnie tear the sleeve of her shirt to get a look at the wound. "Not exactly how I would have liked to get my shirt off around you." She said to Donnie as she winced a bit in pain. The purple masked turtle managed to blush just a bit as he took the first aid kit from his older brother to look at the wound.

"What happened?" Angel asked.

"We ran into Parasiticaqueen again." Mikey answered and then hesitated. "Of course neither of you weren't around then, so I guess that doesn't mean too much."

Then Angel noticed Usagi. "Hey, what's with the trix rabbit in the samurai get up?" She asked.

Usagi wasn't sure if he should be offended or not. It was Karai who spoke up. "He's a new friend, and he's the one who took Tiger Claw's tail." She laughed again at the thought as she added jokingly, "Might want to remember that the next time you consider teasing him again."

Angel laughed too. "Duly noted." She said.

Splinter had come out of the dojo because of all the commotion and saw their new samurai friend. Usagi saw him as well and bowed before him. "I am honored, Hamato Yoshi." He stated. "I am Miyamoto Usagi."

"How do you know who our dad is?" Raph asked suspiciously.

"I heard about him from my teacher." Usagi explained. "He was very impressed with you even though you were a ninja." He then told them his father's name.

Splinter nodded in understanding. "I see, Miyamoto Usagi." He then bowed to the mutant rabbit. "I too am honored by your presence within my home." He looked to his students and then back to mutant rabbit. "After Donatello has attended to April perhaps you can tell us what brings you all the way to New York."

After a few minutes Parasiticaqueen stopped flying away from the battle site to consider her next move. She had to find yet another place to get her eggs placed and create her army.

She never heard the approaching figure and jumped slightly when a lilting and arguably seductive voice asked, "Having a bad day are we? Troubled by those mutant freaks and their allies?"

Parasiticaqueen turned and found herself face to face with Kitsune. Despite her appearance of being a slim Asian woman the mutant wasp knew there was more here than met the eyes. "What do you want?" She demanded to know.

Kitsune laughed. "Spoken like a true queen, even if the true queen is right here." Her voice turned cold. "Give me the fragment, now. Or else."

Parasiticaqueen got ready to attack. "Or else what?" She asked.

Then from either side two figures darted from the darkness and struck her down. A small white hand caught the fragment and then both figures were bowing before Kitsune, the fragment extended as an offering. Kitsune reached down and took it. "Excellent. Now for the next stage in our plan; collection." With that she laughed and led her two shadow companions away.

What will Usagi do now? What are Kitsune's plans? Who are these new allies of hers? The adventure continues.


	55. Ensnared

Donnie had treated April's wound and declared it clean. Jennifer came over to heal her red headed friend as the rest of the group took seats around the couch so that their new mutant rabbit friend Miyamoto Usagi told started to speak. "Not long after I was born, the Kraang took me away from my parents. They took me to their lab and mutated me into the current form you see today. They wanted to see what would happen if they were to let one of their 'accidental' mutations develop. Then one day there was an attack and in the chaos I escaped."

"Who attacked the Kraang facility?" Casey asked him.

Usagi shook his head. "I didn't know then and I still don't know now." He admitted. "I wandered the streets for days before my sensei found me; he is the closest I ever had to a father." He looked to Splinter and then Leo. "He was the one who taught me the ways of the samurai, much as Hamato Yoshi taught you four the ways of ninjitsu."

Karai, from her position next to Casey, wanted to prompt Usagi to get to the point where he took of Tiger Claw's tail but kept her peace. She didn't want to appear rude.

"Three years ago Tiger Claw attacked our residence and on orders killed my father and injured me. He left me for dead as well." Usagi said. The revelation caused the pretty blonde to hesitate in her healing for a second before she remembered her friend was still hurt. "But I recovered and went after him as revenge for killing my father. I intended to kill him but only succeeded in taking off his tail."

"And we all thank you for that one." The kunoichi remarked but didn't follow up after getting a look of disapproval from her father at the interruption.

"After that I lost track of him, and I assume in large part that was because that was when Oroku Saki, the Shredder, contracted Tiger Claw to join the Foot Clan as the new second in command." The mutant rabbit continued. "I only recently learned that Tiger Claw was here and I had to come after him."

"Still, you came to our aid even though you didn't necessarily have to." Leo said to him as he bowed to Usagi. "For that I thank you on behalf of my family."

"Speaking of thanking," Raph said and looked to Karai. "I have to thank you…for having Jennifer's back against Hector tonight when I couldn't."

Karai gave her red masked brother a subtle nod. "Anytime Raph." She said. She hadn't gotten to the point where she felt comfortable saying so out loud she was very quickly growing fond of her extended family; from her younger brothers to Jennifer who was basically the opposite of her in pretty much every way.

"So you're telling us that somehow this Parasiticaqueen somehow got ahold of that fragment of the eye of sarnath?" Angel asked. "And was using them to rapidly grow her drones…but how the hell did she get a hold of it?"

"That's a good question." Donnie conceded. "The problem is that we don't know if these fragments fell to Earth at the same time as the alien who gave us the tracking app or if someone else was responsible for it and the alien was here to collect them."

"But we still don't understand how this connects to Angel's Nightwatcher armor either." Adelita replied. "I mean, it sounds to me like maybe someone intended it to be a weapon though when the fragments were separated and they lost the suit the plan fell short."

"My sister has a good point." Aaliyah agreed. "Except for the one question of who brought them to Earth."

"My money would be on the Kraang." Jennifer said as she finished healing April's shoulder. The red head flexed it experimentally and then nodded and smiled her thanks to her blonde friend. "They're the only other aliens around here and they seemed to know he was coming."

"Then how did they lose the bracelet that Angel found?" Casey wondered. No one had an answer to that question.

"Now that April has been healed, perhaps you should attempt to find Parasiticaqueen and the fragment before the trail grows cold." Splinter advised them.

"But sensei, enchiladas." Mikey pleaded. Splinter gave him a severe look.

"Actually I think Mikey is right." Aaliyah said. "We've all just got done fighting one of our various enemies and could use the recharge." She shrugged and had to smile at her older sister. "And my sister is really good cook, so that's worth it too."

"I had some help." Adelita replied as she smiled too.

"You had an advisor." Angel corrected with a laugh. "You're still the real cook between us."

Splinter sighed but he could see the female turtle's point. "Point taken. After dinner do your best to recover that last fragment. Do not forget we still have to figure out how to get the one the Shredder possesses."

"That loss wasn't our fault." The mutant warthog Zeck was complaining uselessly to his partner Steranko as they headed toward Stockman's lab as per Shredder's orders. "It was those 'super' foots that failed, not us." He sighed and shook his head. "Besides we got away with the fragment."

"It is no use complaining comrade Zeck." Streanko the mutant rhino said to him. "Shredder is hard taskmaster, but it will not last forever."

"If you say so baby S." Zeck sighed. He wasn't sure how they would get out from the Shredder's iron fists, unless they got rid of the Turtles and/or became human again. Of course that first solution worked to everyone's advantage.

The two mutants were so busy talking that they didn't notice the shifting of shadows, though they felt the impact of something hard against the back of their heads before all went black.

Two crab clawed Dark Oni stood behind them and then from more shadow came Fulcanelli Quinn, his eyes blazing and a gleeful smile on his face. "Now let's get the fragment that the pathetic fly mutant has." He declared.

They followed the corridor and he sent in two of the ninja Dark Oni, who quickly subdued the Stockman without any problems and reemerged with the fragment. One of them handed it to Fulcanelli. "Now that we have this, it's time to track down the other refugee from Hell." He said.

They had just finished dinner, with compliments going out to both Adelita and Angel, when April's T-phone went off. They recognized it as the fragment tracker app that had been developed, the primary monitoring had gone largely to April in wake of Donnie working on the Thanosoid scrap they had brought back and Rockwell, when the Mutanimals were there, working on the parts of the Superfootbot they had recently encountered.

"That fragment is out of the sewers, which presumably means that Parasiticaqueen is also out." April said.

"Time to move guys." Leo said. "We don't want her to keep that fragment and we don't want Shredder, The Kraang, or Bishop getting their hands on that fragment either."

"I'm going with you guys this time." Angel told them. "If it involves that fragment you might need me to help out anyway." No one argued that and Splinter promised to help Adelita clean up from dinner so they could go about their mission.

They took the Shellraiser and left the tunnels to hit the streets. Donnie monitored the screens for any signs of Parasiticaqueen and Angel was thinking she would have been better off just activating her armor and going on foot but then there was a blur of motion and the purple masked turtle called out, "Leo, stop."

The blue masked turtle tried to slow down and for a moment thought he was going to hit whoever was in front of them but then the figure jumped and past the Shellraiser before impact and the vehicle stopped.

"What did we almost hit?" Aaliyah asked.

"I don't know but the fragment trace is on them." Donnie revealed.

"I guess that means Parasiticaqueen no longer has it." Usagi noted. "It's time then to find out who does have it." It was pretty much a unanimous decision and they got out of the Shellraiser.

In front of them they found who had almost been hit, and Raph kind of wished that Leo had done so after all. In front of them was none other than the demoness Kitsune, along with a dozen white ninjas. "It's so nice to see you again." Kitsune said, her voice sounding like a delighted young woman. "I believe that I found something you were looking for." She added as she showed the fragment of the eye of sarnath she had gotten from Parasiticaqueen.

"How did you get a hold of that?" Mikey wanted to know.

"I had a little chat with a very big wasp." Kitsune answered with a subtle shrug, as if it had really been some sort of negotiation rather than an ambush. "Me and my lovely associates."

"I don't think your white ninjas really appreciated the compliment." Angel commented with a smirk. True to her words the white ninja were less than impressed.

But Kitsune laughed. "Oh my rude little girl." She replied condescendingly. "I wasn't referring to these gentlemen." From the rooftop two figures jumped down to stand on either side of Kitsune. "I was talking about my lovely daughters."

Both of them were fox mutants. The one on Kitsune's right was a brown colored fox who wore a purple shirt and black jeans. She had a sheathed sword affixed to her hips. The other was an arctic fox who draped herself in a black cape and a black shirt. "Meet my girls, Ninjara and Alopex."

April had to admit it made sense as Kitsune seemed had a connection to foxes by Japanese legend. She just wondered how this woman, demon or whatever had made two mutants out of nowhere.

Casey shook his head. "Wow, it's just weird how that works. I mean mutant foxes, mutant turtles, mutant hawks, even mutant snakes all manage to have a nice set." He mused to himself, drawing a bit of a blush from the girls around him. Karai nudged him and gave him a semi mock glare.

"Yeah, grand." Raph said, his mind more focused on what needed to be done. "Give us the fragment and you and your little friends can go."

"Oh, we can't do that." Kitsune answered as if it were an exceedingly simple matter. "So if you insist on pushing the situation then I suggest you be sure about this."

"How does she manage to sound so reasonable and sound like such a…" Renet started but struggled for the words.

"Such a bitch." Karai finished up for the apprentice time mistress. "It takes practice but trust me when I say it's doable."

"You should know." Raph couldn't help but point out but Karai shrugged like she honestly didn't care that it was technically an insult. If anything it was like she was wholeheartedly agreeing.

"How very rude." Kitsune snapped at them. "When did girls become so thoughtless and inconsiderate?"

"Same time old people got so judgmental." Karai responded with what seemed to be a casual shrug. "And even worse here since you're not even a person."

"Person I may not be, but I am still your elder." Kitsune sighed and pointed to the team. "White Ninja, my pets, teach them a lesson." With that the two fox mutants and the group of white ninja started to attack.

Raph took out his sais and twirled them a moment. "Finally, we get to the fight portion of this program." He said with a smile and added, "What can I say, patience is also in short supply in this day and age."

"We just know now how quickly life can change, not always for the better." Angel supplemented helpfully as she twisted the bracelet and activated the Nightwatcher armor. Then the white ninjas struck.

"Usagi, they fight well and don't feel pain." Leo told their new rabbit ally as he blocked an incoming sword attack and then kicked him back. "You have to…" The blue masked leader ended his explanation as Usagi jumped back, delivered an elbow into his opponent's chest and then cleaved his sword against the eyes to make it disappear in smoke. "Never mind."

Miyamoto Usagi laughed a bit. "Thank you Leonardo, but I remember reading about these things in some of my father's texts. Including their weakness." He said.

Aaliyah jumped over one white ninja as she drove her foot into another one's head, and as if fell she brought one of her bunrei over its eyes to defeat it. "I'm surprised that samurai know about that. I mean it's different from the art of ninjitsu and all." She remarked.

Usagi blocked another one and then flipped behind it. When the white ninja turned again he finished it off. "Something's are universal between each mystic art my friend." He answered the female turtle. "There are many stories of these sorts of ghosts."

"It would be interesting to hear those sometime." Leo said as he clashed with another one.

Usagi would have replied but he got tackled from the back. The agile rabbit mutant rolled with it and stood to meet his adversary, and found himself face to face with one of the fox mutants Alopex. "I hunted your kind in the cold forests of Arklay mountain for years." The arctic fox said. "I can take you out easily."

"Perhaps you can." Usagi relented though he didn't think that was true. "But it only time will tell rather that is the case for you tonight."

Alopex tried to drive her claws into his chest but Usagi deflected it easily and then aimed a kick at her chest but the arctic fox mutant dodged it and swept his legs out from under him. The attempt to dig her claws into Usagi's eyes only resulted in him catching her stomach against his feet before flipping her off of him and rising, ready to go again.

"This would be much harder to do without those enchiladas we had for dinner." Mikey said as he smacked a white ninja in the face and tripped it, allowing Raph to graze the eyes with one of his sai on the way down. "Remind me to thank Adelita for that again."

Angel found herself thinking she needed to get some sort of weaponry to work with. The armor was great for defense and was also great for hand to hand combat but if anything more was needed she found herself a bit flat. Still at least the swords that struck did nothing to her and she just kept attacking them until someone else could get to them.

Ninjara attacked Karai and the two were discovering very quickly that they were evenly matched in skills. The kunoichi debated trying to poison her opponent but almost immediately rejected that idea. Until they knew more about either of the fox mutant's motives she was hesitant to do anything that might end up in their deaths.

"You fight well." Ninjara conceded to Karai as they clashed sword to sword. "I can smell that you're more than human but unlike with most of your friends it doesn't really show."

"Hope it doesn't come to that." Karai warned her sincerely. Ninjara didn't seem to believe it and right now the kunoichi didn't have any inclination to prove her wrong.

Despite the fact that a few of them; such as Mikey, Donnie, Angel and Casey, didn't have pointed weapons readily available to take them out and despite Ninjara and Alopex distracting two others they were quickly dwindling down the white ninjas.

"You're running out of time Kitsune." Raph said to the mysterious and possibly demonic woman. "Give us the fragment now."

"I wouldn't be so confident in that my reptilian friend." Said a voice from the darkness. Moments later they were all shocked to see Fulcanelli emerge along with several Dark Oni."

"Father." Jennifer gasped, shocked and even a bit afraid.

"Guess that trip through time didn't hold." April noted dryly.

Fulcanelli laughed. "Yes." He looked to Renet. "I owe you for that one my little friend." He turned his glare to Jennifer. "Though you, my daughter. You I owe quite a lot for. If you hadn't ran and been found by these freaks then my plans would have gone ahead unhindered."

"You won't be touching her." Raph promised.

Again the sorcerer laughed. "Do you really think that you can stop me?" He questioned. "The only reason that your orange masked brethren is alive today is because of the little witch." How the girl had stopped his ultimate weapon, la Brulure noire, was beyond him.

"I'm not a witch." Renet said somewhat irritably. "I'm an apprentice time mistress." It then occurred to her that maybe she shouldn't have said that to their enemies if they didn't already know that like Savanti Romero would have.

Fulcanelli looked around and smiled though it was far from welcoming. "Some new allies I see. A rabbit and some armored metal freak." He mused.

"Metal freak?" Angel questioned and it was then that Jennifer's father heard the feminine voice behind the mask as she hadn't activated the voice modulator. It seemed pointless at this time. "Why don't you come a little closer and say that again you old bastard."

Again Fulcanelli laughed and waved his hand. "Dark Oni, it is time. Take out these freaks." More of the regular ninja Dark Oni appeared and started toward the fight.

"Bros, it's time to take it to them." Leo said to his younger brothers. He looked to Aaliyah, April and Jennifer. "You've got the sharp weapons so you take out the white ninja. Casey, Angel, give them a hand." He already knew Usagi and Karai had other distractions in front of them.

The three girls nodded their consent as did Casey and Angel a moment later. Raph twirled his sais. "Let's do it then fearless." The red masked turtle pronounced. All four brothers activated something they hadn't needed too since Chein Khan realized they couldn't slow them down when they did so, they activated the magic of their weapons.

Fulcanelli watched as the four reptile brothers engaged the Dark Oni in combat. He even heard Donnie say, "I guess we know who got a hold of that medallion after Hector dropped it a couple of days ago."

Kitsune looked to the sorcerer intrigued. "And why exactly are you helping me?" She asked him.

"Do not play games." Fulcanelli chided her. "I am fully aware of who and what you are. As well as where you came from. And where you are going."

Kitsune laughed. "Oh?" She asked sweetly. "And why is it relevant to you?"

Fulcanelli snickered. "Because we have something in common and together we can make everything we're looking for into reality." He replied.

"If that's the case, then surely you have the means to get us what we need now." Kitsune said.

"Indeed I do. Fulcanelli confirmed. "Just as soon as they all weaken themselves up just a bit."

None of them had heard their conversation, busy as they were dealing with the Dark Oni and the white ninja though both groups of minions were starting to dwindle down. They were also tiring down, and on top of that Ninjara and Alopex were giving Karai and Usagi a run for their money.

"You are very skilled." Alopex relented to Usagi. "But I will find a way to win. Even the fiercest of predators fall to the most cunning of 'prey." She struck again and Usagi countered.

"I promise you it will not be today." Usagi said to her. "I have a prior engagement that I must maintain."

"So between us girls, why are you working for Kitsune anyway?" Karai asked Ninjara as they clashed. "I mean sure she claims you're her girls, which I can only assume means you think of her as your mother, but really she's just using you."

Ninjara laughed a bit. "You make quite a few assumptions." She told Karai. "We both know she's not family. But she made us what we are today and…"

Karai interrupted her. "And you owe her for that?" She questioned. "The man I called father pretty much made me a lot of what I am today but that doesn't mean I owe him anything for lying to me."

Ninjara glared at her. "You think you understand so much, don't you?" She asked. "But trust me when I say you don't understand nearly as much as you think you do."

Both fox mutants noticed that the white ninja and the Dark Oni were basically thinned out. Granted either of them could summon the minions at any time but none the less it was not promising.

"Give it up Fulcanelli, Kitsune." Leo called out. "It's done."

"Oh, really?" Fulcanelli questioned. "We are…." He held up the fragment that he stole from the Foot Clan HQ. "Two to one." The sorcerer finished as Kitsune held up her fragment.

"Isn't that just great?" Angel commented. "Now we got to take both fragments from them."

"Now why don't you be a good little girl and come with us?" Kitsune suggested to Angel.

She laughed. "As you've already pointed out, I'm definitely not going to be obeying any of your 'commands'." She replied.

"Then we do this the hard way." Fulcanelli said. "I should have used this earlier, but now I will remedy that now." He again waved his hand and they heard what sounded like a large creature land around the corner.

"Ah, sewer apples." Raph muttered. "Anyone manage to bring the Turtle Mech this time?"

After a second what sounded like metal on ground Mikey shook his head. "Yeah, didn't think so either."

Then from the corner emerged a demon, easily half the size of the Turtle Mech. The loud noise had emanated from mechanical legs, attached to the demon from the feet up to just under the knees. Instead of a right hand and arm it had what seemed to be a rocket launcher attached.

"Holy moly." Mikey gasped. "Looks like Billy Goat Gruff went and got himself upgraded."

Raph heard Jennifer gasp. "Oh my god." She would have lost her balance if he and April hadn't rushed to her side. She was clearly terrified though none of them knew why.

Fulcanelli laughed. "The girl in the armor must be ours. The others can die for all we care." The large creature launched several rockets straight at the team and everyone moved to dodge it. They avoided the most destructive of the attacks the ricochet enough was bad enough.

The Shellraiser toppled over right on top of April, Casey and Jennifer stood. There was a loud crashing and then all was still over there. Fulcanelli assumed the three humans had been squashed underneath the vehicle.

Karai crashed through one of the store windows. Ninjara was barely able to dodge out of the way.

Usagi flew through the air only to land hard against the windshield of a car which also set off the car alarm though it was kind of synchronous with all of the other sirens of the city. Alopex was also barely able to dodge the attack.

The portion of the building Karai had been forced into window first came down hard on Raph and Mikey.

Leo and Donnie slammed hard into a fire escape stairwell and a moment later the impact caused the metal to collapse on the two turtles.

Angel herself struck another wall hard and she hit the ground almost as hard. She coughed a bit as she tried to get up only to get slammed down hard by a magical attack from Fulcanelli. He then lifted her unconscious body up easily. "We have what we need. Next stop is the EDF." He said to Kitsune as he sent the creature that had done the damage through one of the portals where the demons emerged from.

"Excellent." Kitsune said happily and even clapped her hands gleefully as if she were a little girl. "Let's go and make our dreams come true." She looked to Ninjara and Alopex who didn't seem too happy about the fact that they had almost been blasted with the others. "Come along girls."

Both Ninjara and Alopex looked back kind of guiltily at the wreckage they had left behind and the bodies and lives they had just seemed to have caused to be left behind…

What condition is the team in? What plan does Fulcanelli and Kitsune have? Can they rescue Angel in time? The adventure continues.


	56. Operation Angel Rescue

Karai wasn't sure how long had passed before she was able to stand up again, though she still heard a ringing in her ears. "What was that thing anyway?" She asked herself. She crawled over the window ledge to see the carnage and an involuntary gasp escaped her lips.

Karai heard a moaning sound to see Aaliyah getting up from her position under a wooden fence that had collapsed on her when she had gone flying. "That was not fun." The female turtle said to no one in particular.

She saw some debris shift and Raph and Mikey were trying to come up from the bricks. Mikey moaned in pain. Raph sat up and glanced around. He could just make out Donnie and Leo making their way out of the metal that had once been a fire escape that had collapsed on them. Raph saw Usagi sitting up and rubbing his head. "Where's Jennifer?" He asked worriedly.

"Not just her dude." Mikey added. "April, Casey, Renet and Angel are missing too."

Usagi, with his superior hearing, cocked his head and listened. "I hear movement from inside of your vehicle." He told the turtles.

"How is that possible?" Mikey asked.

Donnie thought a moment. "I don't think we closed the doors when we got out after Kitsune got in our way." He said. "They may have been able to slip inside before it would have otherwise fallen on them."

"Only one way to find out." Leo said as they all shuffled over to where the Shellraiser was and started to work on raising it up. Even with five turtles, a rabbit and a kunoichi they were having a hard time lifting it up. It suddenly became a lot easier when Slash and Leatherhead appeared out of nowhere and helped them lift it up.

As soon as they got it up there was some thumping before April, Renet, Casey and Jennifer stumbled out. "I don't want to go on that ride again anytime soon." Casey noted with a sigh.

In an instant Karai had her arms around Casey, Raph had his arms around Jennifer, Mikey had his arms around Renet and Donnie had his arms around April, all four of the Hamato children glad that their love interests were unharmed. Leo had drifted over to Aaliyah and had taken her hands in his own gratefully.

"Guys." April said after a moment of enjoying Donnie's closeness. "I don't see Angel anywhere."

"We haven't seen her either." Mondo told them.

"Not that we're not grateful or anything, but what are you guys doing here?" Raph asked them.

"We received a text from your friend Adelita to track you guys and help you out." Rockwell answered the red masked turtle. "We were tracking you on the T-phones which became redundant after the large explosion."

"It was this giant robot legged rocket launching goat demon thing." Mikey told them. "We thought that thing in Central Park was huge, this thing topped it."

"We haven't seen Angel either." Candy told them. "Could she have been grabbed by that giant demon thing?"

"It seems likely." Donnie said. "I remember Fulcanelli saying that they wanted the armor but he didn't care about us."

"Fulcanelli?" Candy asked. "He's back?"

Each of them nodded. Then Leo sighed. "Well, we heard for whatever reason they're going to the EDF. We're going to have to follow."

"Why go there?" Pidgeon Pete asked.

"My father and Kitsune seem to want to negotiate with Bishop and his employer." Jennifer replied. "And somehow I think they might be more connected than they think."

"I was thinking that too." Leo said. "Something about that doctor and that sergeant…it reminds me of those demons Fulcanelli is commanding."

"Who cares what they are." Raph said. "Come one Fearless, we have to go and get her back before they…do whatever with her."

The team took off toward the EDF base. April texted Splinter and Adelita so that way they knew they were okay and what was going on.

Angel opened her eyes gradually. The first thing she was aware of was that the area was dark. She tried to move her arms only to find, somewhat unsurprisingly, that she was restrained. She found her legs restrained as well. She hoped it was too dark for anyone to notice she was awake.

"I see you're awake." A voice said, dashing that hope. She could make out the vague silhouette of a man in a business suit but she swore something was off. The man had horns on his head.

"Who the hell are you and what do you want?" Angel demanded as she tried to struggle to no avail.

"You're wearing what we need." The man answered her as he moved closer. "The armor that you apparently called Nightwatcher armor is needed to channel the energy of the eye of sarnath. At least until we figure out an alternative."

"And what shall I be carving on your tombstone once I get out of here?" Angel asked again.

"You think you're leaving, how cute." The man noted with a smirk. "You can call me Null, my dear. Of course in any other circumstance you'd be calling me master instead."

"As if." Angel retorted. "I don't know who you think you are but no one will ever have that kind of control over me."

Null gave a cruel laugh. "Pray you don't get to test that out." He warned her. "But in the meantime we're going to give you the other two fragments of the eye of sarnath and then control the energies through you and the apparatus we have you attached too." He started to walk away. "And the first thing you're going to do is eliminate the turtles, the Mutanimals, and that hockey masked vigilante of theirs."

Angel noticed something disturbing. "You left a few people out there." She said.

Null laughed at her. "Surely you're joking. If what I said to you wasn't clear enough; I don't kill women my dear, I use them." He laughed a bit. "Something I'm told by one of my new associates that one of your little blonde friends should be more than used too."

Angel glared at him. "If one of my friends doesn't take your head off, I will." She vowed.

Null laughed. "They won't have the chance, and ironically it will be all because of the power you've tried to use as your own." The doors opened and Doctor Malcom came in with the two fragments given to them by Fulcanelli and Kitsune. "Get her prepped and get the machine running, it won't be long before her little friends show up."

Unknown to them, Ninjara and Alopex watched from the shadows. Neither fox girl could understand why Kitsune would choose to ally them with a seemingly chauvinistic and cruel demon.

The team decided to go in through the top, where Hector and the Foot Clan had chosen to break out of the area after stealing the fragment that apparently Fulcanelli stole back. The idea was to work their way down or find some sort of map for the place. It was hoped their group would be big enough to take out whatever got in their way.

"We need to find a computer or something." Donnie said. "That might give us an idea of where to go."

"Won't that be encrypted?" April asked. "I mean I know you're good with computers and I'm not bad either and I'm sure Professor Rockwell has to be good too but we are talking about a government computer system."

"Um, can't we just follow the T-phones tracker app to lead us straight to the sarnath fragments energy source?" Mikey asked. Each of them exchanged looks of shock. Mikey had just had a great idea.

"Don't be going all Dimension X smart on us now." Raph said to his youngest brother as Donnie took out his T-phone to do as Mikey had suggested.

"No worries homie." Mikey replied, not really being aware of the fact he had just kind of insulted himself.

They started to go down the stairs as stealthily as possible considering the number of the team and the size of some of the mutants. One door opened to reveal an EDF guy more curious about what the noise was than knowing what was going on and Raph knocked him out.

"I feel kind of sorry for those people here who don't really know what's going on." Jennifer lamented quietly. "They're just doing their jobs and don't realize that their bosses are evil."

"I do too." Leo admitted. "But we can't leave anyone who sees us going down conscious and risk them setting off an alarm."

Raph seriously though about teasing his older brother for his softness but refrained from that since his girlfriend fell into the same category. For better or worse his older sister more or less voiced his thoughts. "We can't go soft now, what matters is getting Angel and stopping their plan." Karai stated.

"She's right guys." Slash said. "We got to do what we got to do, at least short of killing innocents."

"Yeah well Bishop should consider himself exempt from that." Raph stated. "As well as anyone else we find at our final destination."

This time they were greeted by the sound of two soldiers coming up the stairs. They all thought something about their chatter was odd, and possibly even inhuman. They didn't have much time to think about it though as Hawlita dove down and five star frog splashed one of them. The other turned in that direction just long enough to get kicked in the head by Usagi. He looked up at the approaching team members. "I do not hear any heartbeat or pulse from them."

"That's impossible." Rockwell said.

"Not if what Kitsune said is true and they're not alive." Casey replied. "If they're like…like zombie security or something."

"Z-secs." Mikey declared in his deepest voice.

"Do you think these are our military officers?" Jennifer asked worriedly.

"I don't think so." Aaliyah replied. "If too many disappeared, even in this day and age, it would draw too much suspicion."

"So where did they come from?" Pidgeon Pete asked.

Jennifer frowned just a bit. "I…I wonder if somehow the demons are from more than just a small area of hell, whatever that means." She speculated. "What if they come from some other place or time, where they have humans to use for their army?"

"If we find a computer terminal anywhere maybe I can find something that would help us answer those questions." Donnie said.

"We won't find them standing here." Leo said. "Let's move it." They all continued down the stairs.

A couple of minute later Donnie was sure they had passed the building proper and were now underground. That was confirmed a moment later by the door opening and they saw their opposition wasn't a human or even Mikey's new christened Z-sec guys. It was instead one of the skeletal demons that had shown up at the power plant.

"Damn." Casey muttered. "Just great."

The skeletal demon aimed its shoulder mounted missile launchers but Raph quickly tossed his sais into the launchers and Leo chopped it almost in half and it vanished. Raph caught his weapons. "I guess this confirms the demon linked theory." He said.

"Just a few more floors down." Donnie reported.

Jennifer and April exchanged glances. It worried them just a bit as they realized they could almost feel the emanations of power from what they assumed was the eye of sarnath. That only meant one thing to them. All the fragments had been joined together.

They had gone the few floors without any opposition and they opened the door and continued on slowly. It was weird at first because it was kind of dark except for flaming lanterns that against the walls. "This is bizarre." Donnie whispered.

They continued on a little way and then Mikey interrupted, "Can I ask a question?"

"Can't it wait?" Raph asked him with a slight glare.

"Not really." Mikey answered and then continued on with his question, "Do lanterns normally have eyes?"

Donnie rolled his eyes as Karai replied annoyed, "No Mikey they don't have eyes."

"So then why does that one have eyes?" Mikey wondered.

Renet turned around to look at him and gasped. "Oh, my. Mikey's right." She said. They all turned to realize that what they had thought were lanterns were instead flaming skulls with horns, and they were getting ready to attack.

"Get them before they get us." Hawlita said and leapt up to kick one of them hard, dissipating into nothingness when it hit the wall.

Mondo brought his skateboard down on one of them causing the same effect as Candy grabbed one by the horns and slammed it into the wall. "They don't burn despite the fire." The mutant axolotl girl noted. "That's weird."

Donnie smacked one with his bo staff. It evaporated but his weapon thankfully didn't light on fire. "Fascinating." The purple masked turtle murmured. "I wonder if that fire is somehow artificial or even generated by something, like holographic."

"Really great Donnie." Raph said as he brought his sais in between one of the flaming skulls which also evaporated. "Let's just cut these guys down to size already."

Jennifer took out one with her batons but didn't notice as one flew past her and took a small chunk out of her shoulder. She gasped in pain just as it flew towards Leathehead and he punched it good.

"Are you okay?" Aaliyah asked the lithe blonde in concern as she used her bunrei's to take one of them out.

Jennifer nodded. "I've had worse." She promised. She saw she was bleeding just a little but nothing compared to when the turtle's had first come to her rescue months ago.

A few more minutes passed, with both Pidgeon Pete and Candy getting a small chunk taken out of them too before all the floating skeletal demons had been eliminated. They were also pretty easy to do though as even Renet took out a few with her time scepter.

Raph looked at Jennifer's arm and was glad to see the bleeding had already stopped. Still Donnie and April took a moment to bandage up the three minor wounds before going on their way.

The trip down the corridor ended in a door that rose at their approach. They entered the large seemingly empty room with what they noticed was something that was either an opaque skylight at the top or was geared to lower something to the floor. From the far top lights flashed and in a skybox like area stood six figures. They recognized Kitsune and Fulcanelli on one end where on the opposite end was Bishop, Malcolm and Thomas. In the middle was a horned man in a business suit they didn't recognize. He spoke now. "Welcome to the games, my friends. It's time to see who gets to live and who dies."

"Why don't you come down here and say that to my face baldy." Raph stated with a glare. "Now tell us where Angel is, right now."

"The name is Null, Mr. Null." The horned man said simply. "And as to your friend, I won't tell you where tell you where she is, I'll give her to you right now." He nodded to sergeant Thomas and he pressed something on his wrist that brought down an enormous generator of some sorts with multiple rods on it. Right in the center of it was Angel, arms and legs bound to the device. The red glow on the chest of her Nightwatcher armor was evidently the fully constructed eye of sarnath.

"What did they do to her?" Jennifer wondered.

April noticed little electrodes connected to parts of her armor that were in the device. "I think they're tapping into the suits power to power up their weapon." She said.

"That's their great plan?" Raph asked. "How ridiculous."

"Pete, Hawlita, get her down." Slash ordered the two flying mutants of the team.

"On it boss." Pete said. Then he and Hawlita took flight and started toward her, but then one of the rods shot out a huge burst of power that seemed comparable to electricity and shot the two of them down hard. Rockwell caught them physically.

"We can still make our way up to her." Usagi said. "We can simply climb the walls."

"I'm down with that bunny man." Mikey agreed and ignored the look of annoyance that he received from Miyamoto Usagi.

"Ah yes, the second part of the plan should start now." They heard Fulcanelli said and with a wave of his hand the large demon he had summoned from the street was right there.

"Double damn." Raph cursed. "We've got more problems than we need."

"We can't let that thing shoot those rockets off in here." Karai said.

"Agreed." Leo said. "Everyone move in close but be careful. This thing will probably try to stomp on us instead."

"Grand, great plan Fearless. Let's become pancakes instead of wall paint." Raph drawled as he shook his head right before they all rushed toward the large demon.

The thing seemed momentarily confused as it had multiple targets approaching and surrounding it. It didn't notice that Casey and Jennifer stuck mostly to the back as the samurai and the ninjas moved up closer. It tried to squash Mikey only for him to barely back flip out of the way.

"This is just too easy." Mondo said, right before a large red bolt struck right in front of the skateboarding gecko and he lost his footing on the skateboard and he fell forward hard. Luckily the large demon didn't seem to notice that.

Leo inwardly sighed before changing tactics. "April, Jones, Jennifer, Renet, Mutanimals, keep this thing distracted." The blue masked turtle ordered. "Turtles, Karai, we need to get up that device, rescue Angel and shut that thing down."

Everyone nodded and they all scattered to the blue masked turtle's orders. Mikey quickly discovered jumping on a ready to fire spike was a bad idea as he yelped on the live spike and then barely jumped ahead again.

Candy got Mondo up and they got going again and it wasn't a moment too soon because the big demon tried to bring his foot down on them.

Both Leatherhead and Slash tried to take the things legs out but were not quiet big enough to get past the cybernetic legs and weren't able to do much damage to it. "I sure hope this thing is unique." April reflected. "If we ever have to face more than one we're in big trouble."

Raph and Leo were getting the closest to Angel as Donnie slowed down to take a look at the device, but at least he had the sense to make sure he wasn't in the direct path of any of the energy bolts.

Several of them shot at the same time and Slash, Usagi, Rockwell and Casey had to dodge the massive attack.

"Dude, we better figure out how to shut this thing down." Mikey called out to his smartest brother.

"I'm working on it." Donnie told his youngest brother though in truth he was already running through an idea on how to kill two proverbial birds with one explosive stone.

Fulcanelli glared at the two turtles and summoned two new demons, both of them floating monstrosities. They were oblong and brown with large mouths and they both opened up and released a fireball. The two turtles threw shurikens that destroyed the fireballs on impact and then they stabbed their weapons into the eye socket, destroying the two demons on their way to the top.

As the two them landed Angel let out a scream of pain as the object drew more energy, from both her and the armor, and lanced it out at everyone on the ground. They all barely dodged it and the large demon itself just didn't seem to care. Both turtles began to cut the restraints off, Raph was joined a moment later by Karai.

Donnie was working quickly on the open panel as he saw another energy beam lance directly at April and Jennifer but Renet stepped in and used her energy knuckles to barely stop the blast and it dispersed against the machine, destroying some of the rods. The large demon again didn't care.

They freed Angel and the two turtles caught her in their arms as the four of them haphazardly made their way to the bottom. Donnie was behind them a moment later with Mikey as the purple masked turtle yelled out, "Forget about the big demon and get toward the door right now!"

There was no hesitation; be it from his brothers, the Mutanimals, the vigilante who had been the rival for April's affections until recently or even the newly joined samurai rabbit. They all ran straight toward the exit as fast as they could. Leatherhead took Angel to make it easier for Raph and Leo to follow Donnie's advice.

"Look at the run." Bragged sergeant Thomas.

"They must be daft." Bishop mused amusedly. "The Cyberdemon will destroy them before they reach the door."

It was then Fulcanelli got it. "Damn it." He cursed.

Before any of the others could ask they saw it firsthand. As the creature Bishop called the Cyberdemon aimed its rocket launcher and got ready to open fire the device started to lose stability as the anchor, Angel, was gone. Donnie had programmed it to use whatever energy had been taken from her and the eye of sarnath to self-destruction.

The self-destruction caused the demon to be destroyed, or perhaps at least damaged enough to force it to retreat. From their hidden vantage point neither Ninjara nor Alopex could be sure. They had already agreed that they weren't going to participate in this battle.

They were just getting out before Renet decided to take the risk and open up a door to get home. It half way worked as they found themselves in front of the Shellraiser. "Well, at least we're kind of safe." Renet said with a shrug.

"Not for long if we don't get a move on." Raph said.

"We'll meet you guys at the lair." Slash told them as the Mutanimals went their own way. The turtles used the Shellraiser to quickly drive off.

Splinter watched as Adelita paced the living room worriedly. "I promise you that the y will all come home in one piece." The rat master tried to console her. "Leonardo will not let anything happen to your little sister."

"I know." Adelita admitted. "I'm more worried about Angel right now; she's trapped in enemy hands. Who knows what they want with her." She started again toward the kitchen. "I'm sure it's because of the eye of sarnath and her armor, but I don't know why."

After another ten minutes or so the Shellraiser pulled up. Angel, now with the armor retracted, was walking toward the couch herself with April and Jennifer behind her just in case she lost her balance. Just as she sat Adelita was over there and wrapped her arms around the Latina girl. "I was so worried about you." She said and looked to the others, looking at Aaliyah last. "All of you."

"Thanks, I think." Angel said as the two of them sat down now. She took off the bracelet and tossed it to Donnie. "I know you want to examine this now, so knock yourself out."

Donnie chuckled nervously but it was true. "I'll give it back once I get what I need to know from it." He promised. "Too bad we couldn't get any information about those things. It'd be nice to have a better understanding of where they come from."

"Why did they take you?" Adelita asked Angel.

It was her sister who answered. "They hooked her and her armor up to some weird apparatus and was channeling the energy to that device to attack us. That was in addition to bringing back that big demon thing that attacked us on the streets."

"Yeah, and we had lanterns attack us and everything." Mikey added.

"Those weren't lanterns." Karai said with a sigh as she sat on Casey's lap and laid her head on his shoulder.

"They're nasty little biters though." Jennifer noted as she sat down. Raph came up behind her and started to gently rub her shoulders.

"I noticed that the two fox mutants that Kitsune had with her on the streets didn't oppose us in that fight." Usagi said as he sat on the floor cross legged, as if he were going to meditate. "Perhaps they did not approve of some method used in that fight."

"Did you learn anything else of value?" Splinter asked them.

"The leader of this group is someone named Null." Leo told their master. "He's a horned man who seems to be a demon of some sort."

"I wonder where he came from." Aaliyah mused softly. "If he had been around that long we should have heard something about him."

"We shall have to begin research into him." Splinter said. "It seems as if we have not heard the last of this man."

What happens now that the eye of sarnath is fully assembled? What plans does Null and his team have now? The adventure continues


	57. Downtime

"I can't believe that!" Mikey exclaimed dramatically as he stood up and placed his hands over his head. "I absolutely cannot believe this! The horror, the horror." He started to fake cry dramatically.

Aaliyah laughed. "Sorry Mikey, but that's how the cookie crumbles." She remarked as she took the controller from around him so he didn't accidently step on it during his mock rant.

"What happened?" Donnie asked as he poked his head out from the lab where he was working on a device of his own. Right behind him was April, who placed her hand on his arm as she looked out with him.

Adelita glanced back at the purple masked turtle and the red head from the couch where she had a sketch pad in front of her, making a charcoal sketch of Ice Cream Kitty as Renet played with her. "My little sister just beat the high score of your little brother." She informed him.

Donnie mock flinched. "Ouch." He stated. "Mikey is obsessed with his scores."

Leo could hear all of this from the open dojo as he practiced his katas with Karai. Each of the were taking some time out to relax in their own way after the ordeal of Angel's kidnapping and subsequent close encounter with Null, Kitsune, and Fulcanelli and his large half mechanical demon before the next problem came out of the woodwork.

Raph looked up from the comic he was reading and laughed a bit. "Hah, about time someone brought down the 'king'." He said. Leaning against his shell and reading her own book, Frostbite from the Vampire Academy series, Jennifer giggled at her boyfriend's comment before going back to her book.

Casey and Angel had a competition themselves going at the Space Heroes pinball machine and Angel laughed. "if it makes you feel any better Mikey, Casey here will be joining you at the low score lane here pretty soon." The Latina girl mocked with a laugh.

"Enjoy it while you can." Casey told her. "I'll swoop in behind and take the gold like a good player always does."

"I think that's called an underdog there Jones." Adelita said. "And I don't know if I'd call you that."

"Yeah, you're too awesome to be the underdog." Raph added mockingly.

"Ah, shove it Raph." Casey retorted as he was trying to concentrate on the game.

Jennifer placed a bookmark into her book and set it down on one of the tables. She then stretched and then reached over to give Raph a peck on the cheek. He used his left arm to hug her for a moment before the blonde announced, "I'm going to get those sandwiches ready."

Aaliyah set her controller down. "I'll give you a hand." She said.

Adelita set her stuff aside too. "Me too." She agreed.

"Want to play Raph?" Mikey asked his red masked brother.

Raph shrugged. "I don't think so." He responded. "I think your ego has been bruised enough for one day."

"You could always work on getting the high score again." Aaliyah said as she followed Jennifer and her older sister into the kitchen. "That way I've got a goal to aim for."

Mikey shook her head. "Man, I want to know where she learned to play like that." He said as he started up a game to do just. "I mean considering she fights as well as we do."

"You just answered your own question genius." Raph said with a roll of his eyes. "We fight pretty well too and we found ways to do our things."

"To be fair that's different." Donnie defended his youngest brother as he came out of the lab, though he had his laptop with him and was tinkering with the programming as they talked. "Aside from training and each other we had nothing else going for us besides our hobbies." He sat down at the space that Adelita had vacated though was careful not to touch her stuff lest he accidently ruin it. "Whereas Aaliyah no doubt had some kind of social life outside of her family."

"Just because someone is human doesn't mean they have to have an active social life." April remarked as she came out with her own laptop. "I didn't have too much of one before I met you guys."

"I wasn't really a social butterfly in LA either." Angel pointed out as she watched Casey play, hoping he made a mistake soon or else she expected to have a hard time taking first place in their little competition.

"Plenty of people have said that it's not about the quantity of your friends but the quality of them." Renet said as she reached out to scratch under Ice Cream Kitty's chin. She then shrugged. "Whatever that means."

"That means it's better to have a few good friends than a bunch of friends you don't really know." Leo said from the dojo entrance where he and Karai had drifted though they still worked on their katas.

Karai said nothing but she fully understood it. The kunoichi had learned that the hard way. One could argue that her 'friends' had been those in the Foot clan but her real friends where here; her brothers, Jennifer, Renet, Casey, Aaliyah, Adelita and even April O'Neil.

"Any luck finding out about Null?" Leo asked.

April shook her head, then had to move a bang of red hair from her face. "Nope. It's like he didn't exist before like a month ago." She answered.

"Maybe it's like Kitsune." Angel offered. "Only came through some sort of portal recently."

"Angel could be right." Donnie agreed. "I mean Fulcanelli seemed to have an idea of who she was. It would imply that she might come from the same place, or at least have some sort of association with, the demons that Fulcanelli has been commanding all this time."

"I've talked to Jennifer a bit about that." Raph said as he leafed through his comic. In truth he hadn't been reading it since this conversation started. "She seems certain that this isn't some alternate dimension or anything like that. These demons are straight from Hell itself."

"Is that even possible?" Mikey asked as he worked on his high score. "I mean Hell doesn't really exist anymore than Heaven does, it's all part of the religious thing, right?"

Donnie was impressed that Mikey made valid theoretical points, but that went into territory that he thought was better to avoid discussing in detail. "Well some of the imagery that these things envelope are reminiscent to nightmares, and even some of the symbols seen on that boss thing we fought at the end of the gang war would support that." Donnie answered.

"Which means these things could have come from Hell." Raph said. "And that Heaven would exist in some fashion, regardless of the religious beliefs."

"Agreed." Leo said. "But of course we have to remember that whoever makes it into Heaven is probably not going to want to leave there the way some of the demons and such might want to leave Hell."

Donnie rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Even Jennifer isn't fully aware of how that summoning thing works." He mused softly. "But it seems to me that it's a willing thing from both ends, they want this war too."

"They do." Renet said. "These aren't minor demons, they're old ones, or at least very near it."

"Old Ones?" Casey asked.

"The original demons, if you believe in such a thing." Karai answered her boyfriend. "The ones that were said to roam the Earth before mankind showed up and somehow removed them from the world."

"They even say that vampires were created because the last demon to leave our world, our realm more accurately, fed on a human and mixed their blood together." Angel added. Their competition was almost forgotten in wake of this conversation.

"But vampires don't exist." Donnie said matter of factly.

"Are you sure about that one?" Angel challenged flatly. "Most people don't think mutants exist and yet most here are mutants. They say aliens don't exist but we know that they do because of the Kraang and Newtralizer at the least. They say demons don't exist but you guys have spent the past month battling them." She listed.

"They even say ninjas as most people think of them don't exist." Karai added. "And yet most of us can prove that wrong. The Foot clan certainly does."

Donnie held up his hands in surrender. "Okay, okay." He replied. "Well we haven't seen any vampires so I still don't agree that they exist but I can concede it's not impossibility. If we can conceal our existence so could they."

"Yeah, so back on subject here." Raph interjected. "So what, we assume that somehow Null came through one of those portal things at some point?"

"It couldn't have been any time before the end of the gang war." Leo said. "He probably would have shown up long before now."

The girls came out with some sandwiches. They had heard most of the conversation as well. "Where does Bishop come into this I wonder." Aaliyah mused.

"I think he's preparing for invasion." Jennifer replied. "I mean the Kraang have invaded twice now in the last two years and we don't know who's coming in the near future. He might figure that what humans have now isn't enough and the only way to counter it would be to use the same technology that they have."

"Not sure I'd call them that technologically advanced." Donnie mused as he leaned back. "Though in truth I wish we'd gotten the chance to get into some of their files to find out what Bishop, his doctor and that sergeant really know."

"What about that 'dino man' thing we've been hearing about?" Mikey asked as he moved to the movement of his game. "Think that's a mutant or a demon of some kind?"

"I don't even think it exists." Angel said with a dismissive wave. "Probably some prank. I mean there's no way to make a triceratops mutant unless you believe the whole Jurassic Park concept and there's nothing intimidating about a triceratops anyway."

"You'd think a prankster would go for a velociraptor mutant." Casey mused.

"Could it be related to the Kraang?" Jennifer wondered. "Some sort of ally perhaps."

"Wouldn't we…you guys have seen them at some point?" Angel asked the blonde. "I mean the Kraang have been messing with all of you for years?"

"Maybe enemies then?" Adelita suggested.

"Why aren't they helping against them then?" Angel wondered.

Renet bit her lip. This was one of these uncomfortable situations where she had those answers but knew this wasn't for her to reveal. She was just grateful that everyone, including Mikey, had wised up to the idea that even if she had those answers she wasn't necessarily at liberty to reveal those. She was also fairly certain they would get those answers soon, rather they liked them or not.

"I know Slash was saying that he and the Mutanimals were going to try to look into that." Raph revealed. "But I don't know if it's one of those things like a wild goose chase."

"Or looking for a needle in a haystack." Casey added. "I mean something might be out there after all, even if it's not what people say it is."

Jennifer and Adelita brought out some more sandwiches and chips as Karai went to get her father for them to eat.

"What does Ice Cream Kitty eat?" Adelita wondered as she looked at the Neapolitan cat sitting in a bowl with whipped cream on her head.

"Whatever cats eat." Mikey said with a shrug. "I give her a lot of like meat and stuff and there always seem to be some sort of frozen fish in the freezer."

Renet took some of the turkey off of her sandwich to give to Ice Cream Kitty.

Karai and Splinter came from the dojo and they made sure to make some room for him on the couch. Mikey paused his game and they turned to the TV where Carlos Chang O'Brien Gambe was making yet another report on the 'dino man'. He was talking with their city's hero Muckman, also a friend of the turtle team, who was saying he hasn't ever seen hide nor hair of this mystery thing.

"What do you make of it Master Splinter?" Leo asked as he took bottled water and handed it to him before taking one for himself.

"There are stranger things out in this world that some 'dino man' as the news refers to it as." Splinter conceded. "However that being said one would think someone we had known would have run into this thing if it existed."

"True." Donnie agreed. "I mean we live here, the Mutanimals live in the sewers and even Muckman has taken up residence in the sewers too though I doubt the public at large is aware of that." He took a sip of his soda. "Statistically speaking one of us should have seen something by now."

"We cannot rule out the fact that we may have missed it." Splinter reminded them all firmly. "We have had problems of our own as well."

"For that matter couldn't this 'dino man' actually be a demon?" Angel asked.

No one really had an answer to that. The truth was none of them knew too much about what kind of demons were out there. There seemed to be nothing similar to the ones that Fulcanelli commanded after all, nor Null, nor Kitsune.

"Well the Mutanimals are already looking into it." Leo decided. "If they need our help or if they learn anything important they'll let us know."

"I could start looking for demon databases online." April volunteered as she reached for a ham sandwich. "The problem of course is determining what is real and what is fake."

"I would not be so quick to dismiss any information, even from the internet." Splinter said. "Everything found has some basis in reality, even though it might be a matter of perspective in most cases."

"Even if it's from Wikipedia?" Casey asked seemingly randomly. Of course he, April, Angel and Adelita had been told time and again in their educational careers that Wikipedia was hardly a viable source of information.

"Remember that anything you can find on Wikipedia they got from another source themselves." Donnie said. "It's better to check out those sources directly rather than just go with the easiest step."

"Okay, so demon database it is." April said with a shrug and then laughed a bit. "Never thought I'd hear myself say that."

"None of us ever thought we'd be dealing with demons." Leo reminded the red head. "Of course none of us thought we'd be dealing with aliens either. Or even the Foot clan."

"Life sure works in mysterious ways." Renet commented a bit nervously. "Even when as an apprentice time mistress…or master, depending on." She still in a way wondered why Lord Simultaneous allowed her to hang out here and do what she did if it was going to cause trouble in the time line.

Even she had no ideas in that regard what it all really meant like he did.

"Any luck trying to find out what we can expect now that the eye of sarnath has been put together and interfaced with Angel's Nightwatcher armor?" Adelita asked as she took bottled water for herself.

Donnie shook his head. "Not yet." He answered. "I think I understand now why that alien being gave us his own tracking ability." He took a bite of his sandwich and after swallowing continued. "It seems like the eye of sarnath isn't really easily detectable by any means known in this century."

"How about on the actual experience end?" Raph asked as he reached for another sandwich.

"I tried to test it out earlier this morning." Angel replied. "At least after I had rested up on 'doctor's orders'." That she directed toward Donnie, who wasn't exactly a real doctor but had basically treated them all for years and had the closest to medical authority but it was something the purple streak haired Latina girl had a hard time coping with. "I think I've gotten stronger in the armor but aside from that nothing."

"I wish we could have salvaged some data from that alien vessel." Donnie said. "Imagine all of the things we could have learned from that."

"If wishes were horse's bro." Mikey said.

"What about wishing horses?" Renet asked.

Mikey thought a moment and then shrugged. "I don't know." He admitted.

"The saying is if wishes were horses then beggars would ride." Jennifer answered. "Which means that we can wish all we want about something but it doesn't change what is. We missed our chance to get that data on the alien ship and we never got the chance to see what was in Bishop's computers." She sighed softly. "There's nothing to be done for it now."

"I could go back to get the data." Renet volunteered, perhaps a bit reluctantly.

"Do not trouble yourself Renet." Splinter told her. "If we are meant to have the data another natural opportunity will present itself."

"I think we've got more to worry about than whatever data could have been on those things anyway." Raph reminded them. "The Foot, the Kraang, all of those damn demons that seem to be associated with Bishop. Not to mention all of those random psychos like Spiderbytez and Newtralizer."

"And Pizza Face." Mikey added with a knowing glance at Renet.

"Never happened Mikey." Donnie said with a sigh, and both the orange masked turtle and the apprentice time mistress had to stop themselves from laughing at that comment.

They finished up lunch and cleaned up. Then April, Angel and Casey left for an afternoon school assembly though Angel suspected it was more than likely a pep rally of some kind.

"Dudes. I can't wait." Mikey randomly burst out as he went back to his video game. "It's almost time for the Crognard the Barbarian series finale." He laughed amused. "It's going to be so awesome."

A/N: A bit short but at least it gives the team a bit of downtime before things start up again. Don't have to ask questions, this is the lead in to my incorporation of Dinosaur's Seen in the Sewers, for obvious reasons I couldn't do one for the Fourfold Trap.


	58. My Dinosaurs Seen in Sewers

Adelita looked up from her drawing as she heard Mikey say, "Yes, the final episode." He then moved to put the VCR in the tape player. From her place next to Leo she saw her now white masked mutated turtle sister shake her head, still not entirely sure why they didn't just find a way to upgrade to a DVD or Blu-ray player. She knew Jennifer would have done it for them easily enough.

"Mikey, you know Raph is going to be super ticked if we watch the Crognard finale without him." Leo reminded his youngest brother as the orange masked turtle he started to walk over to sit with his brothers.

"Oh yeah?" Mikey questioned. "Well the Crognard finale will be super ticked that he didn't show up on time to watch it." He responded and then winked at Donnie before turning it on.

The four turtles and Adelita watched as Crognard took a few ineffectual swipes at a large multi headed dragon, then a head moved in and they heard the sound of bones crunching. Five pairs of eyes widened in shock and disbelief as they showed the crown the barbarian wear get spit out and after a cry from the weird Smooch companion it showed The End.

"That's it?" Mikey questioned incredulously. "After all of those adventures he just bites it?" He ran his hands over his cheeks. "What kind of anti-climate ending is that?" Adelita snickered a bit, reminding her of Mikey's at the moment not present girlfriend the apprentice time mistress Renet, who had been called back by Lord Simultaneous for something important, who always seemed to get cool and cold mixed up.

"Anti-climactic." Donnie corrected his brother automatically. "Wow, what a bummer ending."

Aaliyah shook her head in mild disbelief as Leo's T-phone went off and he took it out to check the caller id. "That was worse than the series finale of Angel; I mean at least you could pretend that the vampire with a soul and other few friends survived, but this?" She wondered.

"Do you think…"Donnie started but when the blue masked brother saw who was calling he interrupted.

"It's Raph." Leo told them. "Um, be cool. Be cool." He answered it then. "Hey man, what's uh what's, what's going down?" He asked.

"You jerks didn't watch the Crognard finale while I'm stuck on Shredder patrol, right?" The red masked turtle asked his eldest brother from a rooftop though in this instance he also wore another piece of cloth over his head that he had worn during their vision quest back at the farmhouse. Standing beside him was his beautiful lithe girlfriend Jennifer Quinn, who had volunteered to go out with him despite the inherent dangers.

"W-who us? Of course not." Leo responded though even from the tinny voice she was hearing she had a feeling the blue masked leader was lying through his teeth. "And even if we did I bet we would have found it incredibly anti climate…climatic." Now she knew they were lying and she rolled her eyes softly.

"Yeah well you better wait until…"Raph started but was interrupted as she heard a voice call out _Raphael_ though because of the experiments her father had secretly conducted on her that gave her some psychic ability, and the fact she was standing right next to the red masked turtle, allowed her to catch it as well. She recognized it as Professor Rockwell, the brains of the Mighty Mutanimals.

The reaction caused Raph to flinch from the surprise and he dropped his T-phone. _We need your help._ They both heard Rockwell continue with.

"Rockwell." Raph murmured and he looked at Jennifer. She nodded her agreement at the unspoken question and together the two of them started off the rooftop and down in the sewers.

Raph slid down and Jennifer had to climb down but she was very quick about. She heard Raph call out, "Doc!"

Jennifer responded automatically with, "What happened?" even as she turned to see the same thing Raph saw; Rockwell slightly dazed on his knees and an unconscious Slash. "Oh my…" She gasped, already worried. She couldn't think of too many people who could do that to the large black masked turtle.

"Where are they?" Raph asked as he and Jennifer approached the two.

"Where is he?" Rockwell corrected Raph and then corrected himself. "Or maybe where is it is the better question. And the answer is gone, for now."

"What kind of 'it' could knock Slash out cold?" Raph asked as he approached his former pet and asking the same thing Jennifer had wondered only moments earlier. Both of them knelt before the fallen turtle.

"A being not of this world. Something beyond monstrous." Rockwell answered them. "Something I feel…"

He was interrupted as Slash sat up abruptly and called out, "Dino man!" Both Raph and Jennifer stumbled back.

Raph helped her recover as he stood up. "Dino man." Jennifer murmured, remembering their discussion of it not too long ago.

"Dino man." Raph echoed. "Wait, some kind of mutant."

"No." Rockwell answered. "Perhaps it's some sort of dinosaur offshoot, evolved in secret over hundreds of millions of years." Jennifer walked over toward Rockwell's fallen helmet.

"He's an alien." Slash put in his two cents worth.

"Somehow I think that might be more plausible." Jennifer agreed as she came back with the helmet and handed it to him. Rockwell nodded his thanks of appreciation to the young blonde.

Raph started to walk back to the manhole cover and Jennifer reluctant followed. "Wh-where you going brother?" Slash asked him.

"If some dino alien is living in my sewers and beating up my friends than I'm going to return the favor." Raph declared.

"We'll return the favor." Jennifer corrected him.

"Maybe you should go back to the lair." The red masked turtle suggested to his girlfriend.

"No, I won't leave you to do this alone." The blonde replied sharply. Though it hadn't happened before Raph recognized the look in her eyes and knew there was no use arguing with her so he nodded in acquiescence.

"Do be careful." Rockwell advised. "He's dangerous, unpredictable, frantic."

"And hits like a runaway bus." Slash added and moaned a bit.

"Noted, now get back to the lair so Splinter can patch you up." Raph said. "Dino man's got a head start, and I aim to get the two of us catched up."

"Be careful in case he circles back around." Jennifer said to the two as she followed her boyfriend.

"Be warned Raphael, Jennifer. He is possibly the most powerful creature we have ever encountered." Rockwell called out their retreating forms. His comment sent a shiver up her spine as she considered how many creatures, demon or otherwise, they had encountered in just her short time with the group.

Donnie hung up his T-phone. "Raph's not picking up. Maybe he's in trouble." He said as he turned to a standing Leo and Mikey was on Donnie's laptop.

"And Jennifer left her T-phone here." Aaliyah announced as she came out of the kitchen holding her blonde friend's T-phone.

"Any luck on your end Mikey?" Leo asked him.

"Nada. The Crognard fan sites all say that really was the last episode." Mikey threw his hands up on his face and then drew them down in exasperation. "What a bust."

Both of his brothers were now on either side of him. "I meant have you found Raph." Leo elaborated and then looked to the computer. "Really though there wasn't like a movie or something after." He wondered.

"At least Angel has some after series official comics to clear things up." Aaliyah noted as she came over to them now.

All four turtles suddenly heard Rockwell in their heads. _Raphael and Jennifer are searching the sewers for the dino man._ He psychically informed them. "Thank you, narrator." Mikey commented absently as he glanced around a bit warily.

Jennifer and Raph found what the blonde assumed were footprints. "How long can a giant dinosaur stay hidden in a little sewer?" Raph wondered.

"Maybe he has a cloaking device of some sort." The blonde suggested with a shrug. She really didn't believe that as a possibility. They continued down the tunnel.

Adelita saw Rockwell floating through the turnstiles and levitating Slash along with him. He set him down as he released grunts of exhaustion before flopping down as well.

The four turtles and Adelita were running over to their friends. "Rockwell, what happened? Leo asked.

Donnie had a question of his own. "Did you say dino man? As in urban legend dino man from the news?" he asked.

"He's no legend. He's real, and he's more powerful than you could ever imagine." Rockwell told them all. "We tried to stop Raphael and Jennifer from going alone…"

Slash interrupted. "That hot head is about to get himself into some hot water." Slash said as he looked at the four turtles.

"And he's going to drag Jennifer right along with him." Aaliyah mused.

"He did try to tell her to come back here with us." Rockwell informed her. "She refused to do so."

Aaliyah rolled her eyes. "Okay, so much for some of her common sense." She said.

Raph and Jennifer came into a small pool area which vaguely reminded Jennifer of where she thought she had heard Karai say she had brought Splinter after Shredder had tossed him into the water during the second Kraang invasion. All seemed peaceful though.

Then Jennifer gasped and Raph looked down to see what had her attention. It was easy to see the silhouette and the air bubbles in the water. Moments later the figure rose to reveal that of a massive triceratops looking alien and he stepped toward them.

"What the heck?" Raph questioned.

"Zog's ready." He said and then coughed a bit. "Orders must triangulate now." Raph and Jennifer slowly started to draw their weapons.

"Back off dino man." Raph demanded and he only responded by roaring at them. He swiped at them and both of them dodged, Jennifer being just small enough to dodge to his right as Raph jumped on his face and against the wall and then landing beside her as the alien's massive fist hit the spot on the wall where the red masked turtle had been moments ago.

"Easy big guy." Raph said as he got ready just in case. "Look man, we don't want to hurt you."

"Please, listen to us." Jennifer implored.

"And I'm not sure we could." Raph noted as he looked to Jennifer.

"Mutators are close." Zog suddenly announced. He turned and shouted, "Come on!" As he ran into both Raphael and Jennifer. The red masked turtle barely was able to grab his girlfriend and turn to the side to make sure her body, a human one being much frailer than a mutant turtle's body, was protected from the brunt of the impact.

Raph lost Jennifer as he landed hard. "Faster than he looks." Raph murmured to himself before having to avoid being stepped on twice from their opponent. That was followed by two more steps and a pound that Raph barely dodged.

Jennifer got up and tried to move in only to have his tail smack her in the face, though rather it was on purpose or not she couldn't tell. She felt a bit of blood inside of her mouth as a result.

Raph moved in and slashed at him a few times with his sais only to see that it wasn't doing anything to him. Zog head-butted Raph and he went flying against the roof and landed hard, dropping his weapons. He sat up and with a slight yelp ran as he worked to avoid getting gored. He vaguely saw Jennifer coming after them.

Jennifer heard him talk about expulsions or explosions or something and then mission status. Then he said, "Command, orders."

"I've got your orders right here." Raph responded as he took out two shurikens and threw them at the alien dinosaur. They hit his head and bounced off.

"That's a pain." Jennifer murmured.

"Power to the Triceraton Empire." Zog declared. "Destroy the Kraang." He started toward Raph.

"Does he think we're Kraang?" Jennifer asked in shock.

"Good question." Raph said to her as he dodged two massive fists from Zog. Raph fell to the ground as he tried to dodge another gore from the large Triceraton. He turned in enough time to see a foot coming toward him that he barely grabbed.

"No." Jennifer stated as she ran over, extended the blades on her baton and tried to stab him with the same lack of effect. He reached out a hand and grabbed her by the face, slamming her against the ladder. Both of the heroes let out small screams of anguish.

"Captain Mozar, orders." Zog stated as he continued to try to squash Raph. "Now." He let out a few coughs again. "Orders for the beacon."

"Orders are stop." Raph choked out as he was slowly getting stepped on.

"On who's authority?" Zog demanded.

"Uh, me, Commander Zoraph in charge. Here, now. Get off my face." Raph got out out of pure desperation.

Zog narrowed his eyes a moment. Then he got up and took as step back, also releasing Jennifer. He then saluted Raph as Jennifer came over to his side and said, "Zog reporting for duty, sir." He then let out a cough. He said something about alerting to the Kraang and then, "Smash them to bits." Before he coughed again.

"What is going on?" Jennifer asked Raph softly. "And commander Zoraph?"

"He was gonna beat us, I had to do something." Raph whispered back to her as she stared at the massive Triceraton. He looked up though and questioned, "So that actually worked?"

"Orders, sir?" Zog asked as he saluted again.

They both stood up. "Oh, uh right. So you think they're out their soldier?" The red masked turtle questioned. He pointed toward Zog. "Then I order you to find the Kraang."

The Triceraton turned around. "Zog has the trail as Zoraph commands." He revealed as he started to walk the opposite way they had come from their battle. "Head down, horns up."

"Well this day is getting awesome." Raph noted happily.

Jennifer shook her head. "I wish I could believe that." She admitted. "Something about this is just wrong. It feels off." With no better options the two started to follow Zog.

Aaliyah watched as Mikey rewound back to the point where Crognard stood with his sword held high. "Oh, yeah. Fixed it. See? Now he wins." The orange masked turtle announced as he looked back to the three turtles.

Leo, Donnie and Aaliyah stood talking after Adelita had led them to Splinter so the two of them, along with Karai, could help their two injured comrades. Leo's T-phone went off again and the blue masked leader went to answer it. "It's Raph." He announced and then answered it. "Dude, where are you two? We've been calling."

Raph told them and soon after, over the noise of a subway, the four turtles came to where they had been instructed to go. Leo opened the secret passage and the four of them went inside.

"About time." Raph said as he and Jennifer go t up to approach them.

"Are you okay?" Aaliyah asked Jennifer.

"Been a lot worse." The blonde answered her female turtle friend.

"Alright, we're here. What's this all about?" Leo asked his brother.

Raph gestured as Zog came out and all four turtles let out a gasp, especially after Zog growled a bit. He then moved to smash the four turtles before Raph called out, "Hold up, false alarm Zog." The Triceraton stopped inches from smashing them all.

"Holy chalupa." Mikey gasped. "The dino man's real."

"And you tamed him?" Donnie asked, pointing to Zog.

"Sorta." Raph answered as he looked to Zog. "He likes smashing stuff." He put his arms on his hips. "Isn't that right soldier?"

Zog growled a bit. "Hold on Raph." Leo interjected. "Did you forget the part where he beat down about a quarter of the Mutanimals?"

Raph hadn't forgotten. "Trust me, I'll explain on the way." He said. "Go get him soldier."

"On the way where?" Aaliyah asked him.

"To the Kraang." Jennifer answered instead. "Zog can sniff them out."

"Zog will lead to Kraang." He said in between coughs. "Beacon needed."

"Beacon?" Aaliyah asked and Jennifer shrugged, uncertain.

"Destruction to the Mutators." Zog said. Aaliyah thought the name rather accurate.

"You tell him soldier." Raph said.

"Old Zog's spaceship crash landed a few months back." Raph started to explain as they walked along. "He's been taking out the Kraang's secret bases ever since. He's on our side."

"And you trust him?" Leo asked.

"Well we bonded over our mutual love for destruction." Raph answered which earned him a glare from Leo and an eye roll from Jennifer. Aaliyah was sure that the blonde wasn't thrilled about this but hadn't seen another option.

Zog stopped. "What's up Zog? You find something?" Raph asked him.

The massive Triceraton coughed again and Donnie asked, "What's wrong with him? Is he sick?"

"I'm starting to understand his backwards talk." Raph answered. "His people, the Triceratons, need nitrogen to breathe.

"And the part where he calls you commander Zoraph and does everything you say?" Leo questioned.

"Hey, I saw the chance to have an attack dino and I took it." Raph replied. "What's the big deal?"

"Because it's a lie. Wonderful." Aaliyah said as she rolled her eyes.

"In his defense Zog was on the verge of killing us before Raph did that." Jennifer defended her boyfriend to them.

"He needs a leader and I'm leading." Raph continued on. None of them noticed him get on his knees and touch the ground.

"I don't know about this." Leo said.

"Ah, he's a mostly rational guy." Raph replied and looked to the Triceraton. "Aren't you Zog?"

"Stomp the Mutators." Zog declared and started to march his feet on the ground, "Man your battle stations. The invasion begins." very quickly getting the floor underneath them to collapse as Leo said something to Raph that neither Jennifer nor Aaliyah caught.

They crashed into a Kraang lab. "You were saying?" Raph repeated Leo's words of moments ago as they all drew their weapons to face the Kraang with their blasters raised.

"It's the ones called the turtles." One Kraang stated. "And the one called tri…tri..tri..Triceraton." That Kraang then tossed his blaster in the air and ran off.

It was so unexpected that both Jennifer and Aaliyah snickered before they realized what happened. "When scary things get scared, we should be worried." The female turtle noted.

Another Kraang said, "Kraang, destroy for Kraang." They started to attack and the team jumped into action.

Leo took out a couple of Kraang and said, "I miss doing that."

Three containers came apart and as three Kraang went into them one said, "Bio droids, engage."

"Not good." Jennifer noted.

Raph took out a Kraang droid and announced, "Me and Zog will take these two." He looked to Zog. "Head down, horns up."

"Mutator." Zog said before he tossed one aside, took another and slammed it into the ground before stepping on it a few times. That got interrupted by several Kraang firing on him to little effect. The last bio droid in the middle turned around to engage its butt cannon.

Zog dodged the laser blasts and the gored the bio droid in the butt cannons, eliciting a sort of squeal from the Kraang inside. He swirled it around a moment and then tossed him on top of some Kraang droids.

Raph stabbed his sai into the device and the Kraang scurried out of it only to be squashed by Zog. He made some comment about an invasion and defeat and Raph said, "You tell 'em Zog."

Donnie was looking at some of the Kraang screens and was about to get blasted by one when Zog rammed it aside. "Wow. Hey, thanks big guy." Donnie said as he turned around to see that.

"Alert the beacon. Send the troops." Zog said. He coughed. "The Kraang, have the back door to space."

"I wish we knew what he meant." Aaliyah lamented as she took out a Kraang droid herself.

"Uh, can we come back to that?" Donnie wondered as he turned to the screens. "I'm about to pinpoint the Kraang's secret hideout." With a bellow of Kraang Zog smashed the screen, barely giving the purple masked turtle time to dodge.

"Or we could smash it to pieces and never find out where it is." He added and turned to the next screen before Mikey tossed a Kraang droid into that one and damaging it, saying something about Crognard.

Jennifer looked to Aaliyah. "So you guys did watch it without Raph." She commented and the female turtle shrugged.

"It was Mikey's idea." She answered simply.

Leo looked to Mikey. "Are you really still mad about the finale?" He asked.

Raph was in the orange masked turtle's face. "I knew you watched it." He said.

Zog smashed the ground and a Kraang portal came up. "Wow, space hole dudes." Mikey said.

"Wow, a portal. I wonder where it leads?" Donnie mused as he put his left hand to his chin. "We should do a test first just in case…"

Raph interrupted his smartest brother. "Get in that foxhole solider." He said and with a salute and a "Yes, sir." he did just that.

Donnie glared at him and Raph responded, "What? That's what I got him for. Good job Zog."

"If he ever comes to his senses…" Aaliyah started with a shake of her head.

"He's not an attack dog, Raph." Donnie reprimanded his red masked brother. "He's a deranged alien we know nothing about."

"What's to know? We hate Kraang, he hates Kraang. Sweet deal." Raph replied and leapt through the portal.

"I'd like to know why." Jennifer admitted. "Having the same enemy doesn't mean being on the same side." With a shrug from Mikey, he went through followed by Leo, Donnie, Jennifer and Aaliyah.

"What do you got Zog?" Raph asked as he came over the Triceraton.

"Mutators are close." Zog answered as he stood up. "There." They all looked up to the last place they expected a Kraang base; the Statue of Liberty.

"The Statue of Liberty…is a Kraang base?" Leo questioned shocked.

"That is so wrong." Aaliyah voiced with a shake of her head. "Just so wrong."

"The Kraang are using the statue of liberty as a base." Donnie said.

"That's just evil." Mikey added.

"The beacon must…"Zog stared and the coughed. "The beacon must go. We have no choice, rally them."

"Awesome job sergeant Zog." Raph said giving him the thumbs up. "You ready to do this?" Zog nodded and they entered the Statue of Liberty. They started up the steps and saw an image of them readying several Technodrome like objects on the other side in Dimension X.

"If they bring all those technodrome's through, we're all basically doomed." Donnie declared to the group.

"Not on our watch." Leo said. "I've got a plan. Listen close because we've got to be precise about it."

He was about to explain when Zog said, "Filthy Kraang. Horn's up." And then went out to charge the nearest group.

"I don't think that was part of the plan." Jennifer noted as they watched him go and take out some Kraang.

"Free for all it is." Leo said.

Five Kraang jumped down and landed surrounding Zog. It meant nothing and he took them out just as another approached. He tried to deny being a Kraang but Zog squashed the head of the Norman looking drone. "Empire to victory." Zog declared.

"You got to admit, he's good with his hands." Raph said.

A Kraang shot out something that enveloped Zog in some kind of energy bubble. "Zog, we've got to help him." Raph declared and started over, Jennifer on his heels.

Leo tried to go with them with the infamous line of, "I've got a bad feeling ." Before dodging some laser blasts.

Mikey and Aaliyah were covering Donnie against the Kraang as the purple masked genius was working on shutting down the portals that would bring the Technodrome things to Earth. "Almost cracked the encryption and then they can kiss their portal goodbye." Donnie remarked.

Two Kraang were about to blast the bound Triceraton when Raph jumped over the bubble and then drove his sai into one Kraang while Jennifer slid under the bubble brought her baton, sharp point up, into the other one.

"I'll get you of their pal." Raph promised as he rolled the bubble slightly to get to the device that had activated it. He pulled off the top and it came off. "Wow, nice. Portable dinosaur." He remarked.

Raph then took out his grappling gun and shot it up toward the top. He offered Jennifer his hand, which the blonde took and then wrapped her arms around his waist so he could hold the gun and Zog.

"Raph, what are the two of you doing?" Leo asked.

"We're going to take the crown." Raph answered as they grappled to the top. "You guys try to shut down the portal from here." The Kraang tried to shoot them down but Jennifer used her batons to deflect the shots, actually taking down a couple of them in the process.

She thought she heard Zog say something about the Empire not being contained. She still had a bad feeling about Zog despite everything.

"The portal is down." Leo heard Donnie announce. "No way they're opening that baby up."

Leo jumped up to their level . "What's this beacon he keeps talking about?" He asked.

"What worries me is that beacons are usually only used for one thing, tracking locations." Aaliyah said to him. "But the question I would ask is who is it meant to lure here?"

Leo's T-phone went off and he answered it. "Meet us in the crown." Raph said to him. "Zog found his old gear."

Jennifer watched as Zog opened a case and took out what she thought looked like an old SNES controller, playing with the joystick a moment before reaching for the helmet she assumed was like their breather's from their time in Dimension X or when Creepweed was spreading his pollen.

"At last…I can breathe again." Zog declared in a voice Jennifer liked even less than what she had been hearing before.

"Good, because it's time to bounce." Raph said. Then the red masked turtle rolled his eyes slightly as he said, "Alright, fine. Commander Zoraph orders you to bounce." With a salute.

"Um, Raph." Jennifer started nervously, having the same bad feeling she suspected their red headed friend April would have. Before the blonde could say anything more Zog turned toward them and blasted both of them with his laser pistol.

"Raph." The red masked turtle heard Donnie say from the darkness.

"Jennifer, wake up." The blonde heard Aaliyah say from the darkness as well after she had taken a moment to see the odd words in the wall and wondered who the hell Venkman was. She was a bit too young for Ghostbusters after all but it might have stirred a memory for Adelita had she been there.

They both looked up to see the four turtles looking down on them concerned. "What happened?" Leo asked.

"Did you get Kraang'd up?" Mikey asked.

"My bad feelings all night came true." Jennifer grimaced softly as the two of them started to sit up.

"Zog found his old equipment and then he turned on us." Raph clarified for the team. He looked to his older brother. "You were right Leo." He looked to Jennifer. "And you were right before he was, sweetie."

"I didn't want to be." Jennifer promised her boyfriend softly.

"Happens to the best of us." Leo assured his red masked brother.

They climbed the statue, Jennifer ignoring her slight fear of heights. Raph was the first up there. "Hey Zog, you're not sore about the whole, you know, commander Zoraph thing, are you?" He asked.

Zog let out a small growl. "No." He answered and Raph phewed before he added, "I expect such treachery from the likes of Earth." Jennifer wasn't sure if she should be insulted by that comment or not. She knew what people could be like after all.

"We Triceratons pride ourselves on loyalty and honor." He went on. "You Earth dwellers are full of lies and deceit."

"Hey," Mikey protested as the others appeared. "Who you calling Earth dweller?"

"Look man, I'm sorry. But you were kind of being a jerk and I had to chill you out somehow." Raph tried to explain as he hopped off a point of the crown and walked toward Zog. "What exactly are you doing with that bomb looking thing?" He asked.

Aaliyah saw the small triangular object in Zog's left hand and gasped, "That has to be the beacon."

"It's not a bomb, it's a signal beacon." Zog confirmed the white masked turtles' realization. "To signal the Triceraton Empire's armada to come and wipe out this Kraang infested planet."

"Yep, you called it." Aaliyah said to Jennifer, trying to hide her sense of worry. "Same enemies doesn't always mean allies."

"What?!" Raph exclaimed right before Zog brought his massive arm down hard onto the red masked turtle.

Leo leapt toward Zog and as he tried to fight him he said, "You can stop the Kraang without destroying the planet you madman." He was having the same effect as Jennifer and Raph had had with their weapons.

Zog tossed Leo in the air with his horns and caught the kusarigama chain that Mikey tossed and twirled him around once before tossing him right into the descending blue masked turtle. Mikey lost his grip on the weapon.

"Zog." Donnie called out. "Think about what our species could learn from each other." He twirled his bo staff to block the chain only to be charged at by the Triceraton. He fell off the crown but hit the arm and slid a little.

"You don't have to do this." Jennifer said. "We can stop the Kraang without killing every life form on this planet." She charged forward with her batons and Aaliyah was right behind her.

"There are better ways." Aaliyah agreed with her bunrei's drawn as well.

Zog swung his tail and smacked Aaliyah right in the chest and she sprawled to the edge where she barely grabbed a crown edge to hang on. His right hand hit Jennifer hard in the chest and she sprawled as she felt a rib in her right side crack. She just managed to grab onto Aaliyah's leg before taking a long swan dive herself.

'I know all I need to know about your planet." Zog declared as he climbed the torch. "You let the Kraang run rampant, jeopardizing the safety of the galaxy. I see no reason to spare you."

"Cause we're friends Zog." Raph said as he stood on the banister.

"Friends?" Zog questioned as he swiped a massive arm at Raph, who jumped out of the way.

"We made a good team." Raph insisted on the 'flame'. "We stopped the Kraang together." He was pacing Zog. "Don't do this, man. Don't do this to our world."

"Enough!" Zog bellowed. He shot three blasts at Raph who dodged them all. The fourth one forced the red masked turtle to jump off and catch himself with his grappling hook. Zo tossed up the activated beacon but Raph swung around and destroyed the beeping object with two shurikens.

"You fool." Zog commented.

"I'm sorry I lied to you Zog." Raph replied. "But I can't let you invade our world"

"I'll squash you." Zog declared. He charged toward Raph who jumped over him and the Triceraton fell over the railing.

Raph ran over to see him dangling. "Zog, take my hand." The red masked turtle said.

"Long live the Triceraton Empire." Zog stated before releasing his grip and falling.

"NO!" Raph called out.

Aaliyah had pulled Jennifer up and Raph's call got them to look up. With two gasps they both tried to reach out to get a hold of Zog before he plummeted, but it was too late. He disappeared in the fog, though it was hard to tell if he hit concrete or water. They weren't even sure it would matter.

"Sorry, Raph." Leo said as he approached his younger brother. "But at least we stopped the Kraang."

"And Zog's signal, thank goodness." Donnie added as he and Mikey appeared.

"Yeah, and on the bright side we don't have to worry about an invasion of space dinosaurs." Mikey chimed in.

"I hope not." Raph said softly. They joined Aaliyah and Jennifer on the crown. "Are you okay?" He asked her.

The blonde nodded. "Yeah, the cracked rib is already healed, thanks to whatever my father did to me." She shook her head. "Never thought I'd hear myself say that." She mused as she took Raph's hand. "Are you okay?"

He thought a moment as he squeezed her hand. "Yeah, I think so. Or at least I will be." He replied.

Unfortunately in Null Time Renet had just been informed by Lord Simultaneous what was to come. He had forbidden her to back, all the while know that not only was the apprentice time mistress going to disobey that order but it was in fact her destiny to do just that. He just wished he knew what do expect from there. There were some aspects of time even he was not meant to control.

A/N: Wow somehow I think this took longer than Mega Shredder. I think it's also been longer than anything I've ever written on my own, and on top of that in some ways harder. Doing Annihilation Earth is going to be something. My only question here would be; is Zog still alive?


	59. The Labyrinth

Fulcanelli watched as several of the EDF personnel set up a small sort of pentagram in the basement of one of the buildings that was owned by Null. He heard Kitsune enter with Bishop, Thomas and Malcolm. "We should be focusing on out new plan." The scientist noted, annoyed.

"You won't need me for that." Fulcanelli reminded him. "That is all on you to get that device working right."

"What are you doing?" Kitsune asked the sorcerer.

"Preparing a nice surprise for the turtles and my daughter." He answered the demoness.

After the incident with Zog everyone had turned in early in preparation for training the next day. Donnie texted April to give her a fast food version of what happened that she could pass onto to Angel and Casey and they would go into more details before training.

When the next day came around the five turtles and Karai were stretching, getting ready for training. Renet watched them from the dojo entrance, currently standing alone as both Adelita and Jennifer were still asleep. Aaliyah's sister of course was not really training after all but it was kind of decided to give the blonde they day off since she had a harder time in the fight than the turtles did because of the fact that, as bad as it sounded, she was only human.

"How long are they going to sleep?" Renet wondered, though to Raph it sounded to him like the apprentice time mistress was whining. "I'd really like the company." She too was not really training.

April, Casey and Angel entered the lair and they started toward the training room. Casey wasn't exactly training either but he was kind of learning. Splinter had of course reluctantly agreed to train Angel since she was going to be 'vigilanting' as Nightwatcher regardless of what was going to happen.

"So I got the basic story, but t what was this specifically about this dino Triceratops thing?" Angel asked.

"Triceraton." Aaliyah corrected the Latina girl. "They're alien triceratopses that seem to want the Kraang destroyed, but even if it's at the cost of every living being on this planet."

"Wish I'd met this Zog guy." Angel commented with a harsh glare in her eyes. "I'd show him what we 'earth dwellers' are capable of."

"No offense Angel but he might have been able to take you out, even with that armor." Donnie said to her as he reached over to rub his slightly sore neck from the impact against the arm of the Statue of Liberty. "He sure did a number to us." The purple masked turtle did wonder though if the Nightwatcher armor, really an alien construct that used the equally alien power source known as the eye of sarnath, would have done against the Triceratons.

"Let's just hope we don't have to find out." Leo said seriously. He hated to admit it but he was very concerned ab out that despite their best efforts, especially Raph's, Zog might have been successful none the less in sending out the signal to draw the supposed invasion fleet to Earth.

"Yeah, let's hope not." Renet agreed uneasily. Lord Simultaneous had already told her what was likely to happen and the truth was, at least as far as she knew anyway, she was here against her teacher's orders.

Splinter emerged from his room near the dojo. "Let us begin training right now." He said.

Each of them got ready to their katas. Raph had kind of hoped that Jennifer would at least be here to watch, even if she was technically excused from training. He of course had been willing to bet that she would train anyway, in her own way his lovely blonde girlfriend was just as stubborn as he was.

Jennifer's mind did in fact wake her up just as Splinter called for training to begin. She sat up and raised her arms in what might have been a luxurious stretch but two seconds after her eyes had opened she realized something was wrong. She was not in her room in the lair. She was instead in what looked to be a small brick room. "No way." She said to herself quietly.

She looked down to see herself in the same oversized pink t-shirt and pink shorts she had changed into before going to bed. She shook her head in shock. Somehow someone had removed her from the lair without her or any of the turtles knowing that. She wasn't sure how that could have happened; even Hector couldn't have gotten away with that.

One of the brick walls rose up on his own and Jennifer let out a small gasp as she saw Fulcanelli standing there. "Dad." She said shocked.

"Hello, Jennifer." He said as he crossed his arms over his chest. She swore if it was possible his response toward her was even colder than she had ever heard it. "I trust you had a restful sleep."

"How did you bring me here?" Jennifer demanded of her father in as firm a voice as she could muster considering her father had always scared her on some level.

"I didn't." Fulcanelli said with a shrug. "You brought yourself here."

Jennifer seemed uncertain for a moment. Then she narrowed her eyes slightly. "You had a spell on me." She ventured.

He laughed though it was without any humor. "A modified homing spell that would bring you back to me with a simple command." He confirmed. "Relatively simple actually, I'm rather glad that a magic user doesn't seem to be in your little friend's ranks."

Jennifer found herself immensely disagreeing with her father. "Why did you bring me here?" She asked as she stood up. She felt a little under dressed for this and was glad at least it wasn't Hector standing before her. Not that he hadn't seen her like this or less. "In case it wasn't obvious I don't want anything to do with you."

"I didn't bring you here for a family reunion." Her father promised her icily. "I brought you here as bait, to lure in and destroy your friends." He laughed. "Though I wouldn't want you to be bored either my dear. Feel free to venture out, if you'd like." With that he seemed to vanish.

Jennifer hesitated a moment. If her father wanted to explore then she knew something was extremely wrong here. On the other hand she wanted to find a way back to Raph and her friends without them needing to come to her rescue if possible. Very reluctantly she stepped out of the small room.

The wall behind her closed down hard after she had left. The outside was no better, a dirt clod path that went in both directions. She swore she could hear the wind but when she looked up there was no sign of a roof or anything she would identify as sky. It was just…blackness, blacker than night could ever be.

She went to the right first to see two more paths and then checked the left that revealed two more paths. "Great." She muttered to herself. "A maze." On second thought she was almost tempted to call it more of a labyrinth. She took a deep breath as she tried to remember what she had heard from someone in school…something called a right hand rule where if a person kept their right hand next to the wall at all times, they would be able to find their way out. It was said to work in any maze, at least in England.

"Let's see where this takes me." She said softly as she took the right hand path and started to walk.

Training lasted about two hours. About a half hour after it started Adelita had come to the dojo entrance with two glasses of orange juice, one of which she handed to Renet as she sat to watch her friends train.

But as time passed Jennifer didn't join them or anything and as training drew to a close Adelita drifted off to make breakfast for them. Mikey quickly dashed out to get to the showers. He didn't have to rush as Karai, Aaliyah and Leo stayed behind to get a bit more instruction. Angel went over to talk to Renet for a bit. Casey sat by the tree as April followed Donnie into the lab so they could discuss an idea.

That left Raph to walk over to Jennifer's room. He wanted to make sure she was okay. He knocked lightly twice. After a moment of not getting a response he knocked again and said, "Jennifer? You okay?"

After a moment of no responses he sighed just a bit as he wondered if she was mad at him for what had happened last night with Zog. Anyone else would have gotten snapped at but with her the red masked turtle found he was always willing to swallow his pride. "Look, I'm sorry about last night. I should have listened to what you said earlier. I'm just not used to the whole women's intuition thing."

After another minute of silence Raph got worried. He opened the door again and reached for the lights but he didn't need them to see the obvious. "What the hell?" He questioned loudly.

"Dude, you'll get your chance." Mikey said from the bathroom as the water started to run.

"What's wrong Raph?" Casey called out.

"Guys, Jennifer isn't here." He revealed.

"What?" Aaliyah asked. "When did she leave?"

"I don't think she did." Raph replied.

"Donnie's checking the security cameras now." April said from the entrance to the lab. "If you guys want to come with us."

In only moments everyone had assembled in the lab as Donnie started to play the footage from the last twelve hours. "No one's come or gone from the lair since April, Casey and Angel came down here." Donnie said. "We'll have to backtrack further on and see if anyone got in."

"Don't forget to apply the infrared filters." Leo said to his smartest brother. "Just in case it was Hector who was responsible for this."

"What do you mean?" Angel asked.

"Hector's shapeshifting ability gives him the ability ty bypass normal cameras, like a chameleon or something that blends into his surroundings." Donnie explained to her as he was searching the footage. "But I was tinkering with infrared goggles that Raph used to identify his position regardless of where he was during our second fight."

"So after that infrared filters were added so that he could be spotted." Angel finished with a nod.

"Exactly." Leo confirmed.

"Well I'm not seeing anything on infrared so far either." Donnie said.

It took rewinding back a few more hours, like about three am, but they saw Jennifer leaving the sewers herself. But what made it suspicious to them was that she didn't seem all that aware of where she was walking. Also she was dressed in what they were all sure was night clothes.

"Why would Jennifer leave the lair like that?" Renet asked.

Aaliyah had a better question. "Why would she leave the lair at all? Especially either on her own or without at least telling someone?" She countered.

"Is she sleepwalking?" Mikey wondered.

Raph smacked him upside the head. "No, dummy." He responded. "If she did that we would know by now."

"You know, I would almost say she was under a spell." Renet mused as she rewatched the footage. "Or possessed."

"I don't think it was either of those things." Angel said.

"Possessed, no." Leo agreed. "Under a spell though, that might be."

April gasped. "Her father Fulcanelli." She realized. "We have to find her."

"I take it she doesn't have her T-phone on her." Donnie speculated.

Raph glared a bit and growled, "Of course she doesn't have it brainiac, she had no clue she was leaving."

"I'm just trying to cover all the bases shell brain." Donnie snapped.

Raph was about to bark something back when Splinter called out, "Enough." All eyes turned toward him. "Raphael, we are all worried about Jennifer and trying to do our best. I know she is your girlfriend but lashing out at your brother's and friends solve nothing."

Raph sighed. "Yeah, I know. Sorry Donnie." He relented.

"I understand." Donnie promised him. "Now then, since we can't triangulate her position via T-phone we're going to have to try to find her another way."

Casey looked over at April. "Hey Red I know you have a sort of unique bond with her because of your similar powers. Can you sense her?" The hockey playing vigilante asked.

April shook her head. "I already tried. She's either too far away from us or she's being blocked somehow." The red head responded.

"Have you ever tested the range on that?" Angel asked her. Again April shook her head.

"It doesn't matter anyway." Raph said. "If Fulcanelli is responsible for this he'll know how to block out Jennifer's senses."

"True." Casey agreed.

"We'll have to search for her heat signature." Donnie decided as he brought up another window on the computer.

"How will you tell hers from all of the others in this city?" Mikey asked a legitimate question.

"Simple." Donnie added. "Her signature has some unique qualities to it due to the powers from those experiments her father conducted on her. It's the same in a sense for April and for us turtles." He looked to Angel. "You might be unique too because of your armor but we haven't tested that out."

"Then find her Donatello." Splinter said. "Before something bad happens to her."

Jennifer walked around, feeling cold and as much as she hated to say it, afraid. She swore she was going around in circles and she could start to smell something that she could only call musty. Other than that it seemed dead, and somehow that made it worse.

It became even worse when she turned another corner and saw some pieces of bones sticking out of the ground. A couple of skulls and rib bones. Even one femur. She wondered for a moment where the other one had wound up before she had another horrible thought. "What the hell did that?" She whispered.

She took a deep breath and tried to calm herself. She knew for a while how much her father would work with demons. The odds were that's what was in her with her. She leaned against the wall suddenly as a memory tried to come to her…

Whatever memory that was trying to come to her faded instantly as she heard a roar. It sounded more like a bull than anything else. For an instant Jennifer feared that it was that large mechanical legged demon they had encountered when rescuing Angel but she somehow doubted that. She would have seen the thing just as she had come out of that room.

"What else could it be?" She asked herself as she racked her brain for the answer. Then it occurred to her. She herself had compared this to a labyrinth after walking out of that small room. She remembered hearing multiple stories about places like these, and most of these kind of things tended to house one thing; legends said they were homes to minotaur's, creatures of myth that were said to have the upper body of a bull and the lower body of a man.

Glancing back she reluctantly picked up the femur bone. It was a bit heavier than her batons back at the lair and didn't have the blade hidden inside of it. But she preferred the idea of fighting the Minotaur if she had too than to do so hand to hand.

She started again to walk carefully. It occurred to her to wonder why she hadn't even heard anything from the possible Minotaur and she briefly wondered if maybe it was dead or something but quickly dismissed the idea. Not only could that kind of thinking get her injured or killed but she also knew her father well enough to know it wouldn't be that easy.

She stopped a moment to try to figure it out, the wind blowing her long hair behind her. She took another right and stopped behind the wall as she had her fears confirmed.

It seemed to be dead center of the maze. And on a throne of bones was the Minotaur. It seemed to be sleeping, it's chest rising and falling steadily and only wearing a rotten loin cloth around the waist. "Damn." She whispered.

"I think I got something." Donnie announced.

"Think?" Raph asked.

"Don't start man." Leo warned him.

"What have you got?" Aaliyah asked the purple masked turtle.

"I get what looks to be a vague heat signature that seems to match Jennifer's." Donnie revealed.

"Why would it be vague?" Adelita asked. "Does that mean she…"

Donnie shrugged. "Maybe, but there could be any number of other reasons too, especially if Fulcanelli was indeed the one who kidnapped her." He replied. "It's on the roof of a warehouse building that I'm willing to bet is owned by EDF."

"So let's storm the place then." Raph said.

Leo nodded. "Raph's right. We know where she is so let's get going before something happens to her."

"Please be careful you guys." Adelita requested.

Angel smiled at her and said, "We'll be fine, promise."

They all used the garage exist to get into the Shellraiser and peeled out of the tunnels. Adelita watched them go. "Does watching them leave to go on a mission ever get easier?" She asked Master Splinter.

The rat master thought a moment and then responded. "There is a phrase that is at least semi-applicable to these situations. 'They also serve who stand and wait.'" He informed the young artist.

Adelita frowned a bit. She thought she might understand the meaning but wasn't sure about that. But a more important question nagged at her as they walked out of the lab. "Does it help?" She asked him.

As Splinter headed toward the dojo he stopped to glance back at her and admitted, "Not a bit."

As they drew closer April sat by Donnie and concentrated. She hoped that she could gradually get an idea of what Jennifer was seeing, and perhaps even what she was thinking and feeling. She was actually getting an image of what she was seeing. "Jennifer seems to be trapped in a maze…with some kind of bull." She said. "It's pretty hazy, I don't know for sure…"

"Um, that actually sounds like she might be in a labyrinth with a Minotaur." Renet told them all.

"Aren't Minotaur's just a myth?" Casey asked.

Karai looked at him dubiously. "You can ask that in a vehicle full of mutants, half mutants and even a time traveling girl?" She asked him. Casey shrugged in response.

"If Fulcanelli is that powerful of a sorcerer he might be able to pull that kind of stuff from the otherworld." Renet said.

"Otherworld?" Angel asked her.

Renet nodded. "It's a realm kind of like hell is, or like Dimension X." She explained. "That's where creatures kind of…ended up when the world basically decided it couldn't handle the idea of certain things existing."

"Like unicorns." Angel guessed. It was kind of embarrassing to admit it now but when she had been younger she had been just short of obsessed with unicorns.

Renet nodded. "Yep, along with like sprites and wendigoes, and centaurs and stuff like that." She added.

"So Fulcanelli used his magic to bring a labyrinth and a Minotaur through and used a spell to lure Jennifer there." Leo speculated. "It has to be a trap of some sort then."

"No duh Fearless." Raph said. "But why?"

"To kill us shell brain." Leo retorted.

"What happens if that labyrinth were to disappear if we were in there?" Aaliyah asked the apprentice time mistress pointedly, trying to avoid a fight between her boyfriend and his red masked brother, especially now.

"Afraid so." Renet replied. "If it disappears with anyone of you inside you'll go with it and probably never return to this realm. Even I probably couldn't reach you."

"So what's the plan then fearless?" Raph asked. "They have to know we're coming and have some kind of plan in mind."

Leo nodded in agreement. "The five of us turtles will go up and get Jennifer." He decided. "Angel, lead everyone else into the building and try to distract whoever is inside, but don't hesitate to retreat if things get to bad in there."

Angel nodded as she twisted her bracelet to activate the Nightwatcher armor. "Will do."

"How are we going to get up there so quickly?" Mikey asked.

"Actually, I have an idea but it's going to be risky." Donnie said to them. "I saw this on an old cartoon, where they have a large spring loaded device on the top of the van to catapult them up into the air." He looked to April. "I've got parachutes in that compartment under Mikey's station, one for each of us."

April nodded and handed each of the turtle's a parachute. Casey took over driving as they all hooked it up. The red head took Donnie's station and calculated the best time to make the jump. "Get ready guys."

They opened the top compartment and then with the push of a button the roof slid back to reveal the spring loaded device. They got ready to jump and April launched them into the air. Donnie gasped, it being more of as shock than he thought it would be. Mikey yelled, "Booyakasha!"

Aaliyah though the flying thing was kind of amazing but she was very hesitant about the landing. They could see the top of the labyrinth and how dark it was. That worried the female turtle but the blue masked turtle didn't hesitate. "Get ready to deploy on Donnie's mark." He told them.

Donnie waited for the descending ark and after another moment of that he called out, "Deploy."

Meanwhile Casey parked the Shellraiser and then he followed the three girls into the building where they saw seven Z-sec guys as Mikey called them standing there though they turned to look over at them.

"Again have to wonder how these guys are making their Z-sec goons." Casey said.

Renet hesitated. She didn't know for sure but was starting to have a bad feeling about it.

"Not important right now." Karai declared. "Take them out. Maybe it will help the turtles and even then at least we can start the distraction." The four of them moved to engage the Z-secs with Renet close behind.

Jennifer started to try to edge around the corner to what she hoped would be the way out when she saw some of her hair get in her face. She absentmindedly brushed it away before a realization hit her. The wind was blowing away from the Minotaur, and by extension her scent away from the Minotaur. Now that it had shifted position the Minotaur could now smell her. "Come on." She whispered softly as tears stung her eyes.

The Minotaur did indeed catch her scent and he roared as he stood up. He immediately fixed his eyes on Jennifer and let out a grunt before he stood up, picking up an axe from the side of the throne that she had not seen. It then charged toward her.

Jennifer dodged the first axe strike that ended up chopping skull in half. She swung the femur around and it connected against the Minotaur's side. It didn't seem to notice the strike but the femur bone shattered in half.

If she didn't know better she swore the Minotaur laughed at her and then struck her with the blunt end of the axe hard. Jennifer fell and she realized that she could feel blood now running down her face from the blow to the side of her head.

It looked down at her and seemed to smile down leeringly. He raised the axe and seemed ready to bring the axe down, perhaps not to kill her but merely to remove her legs so that she could not run away.

Two shurikens came from seemingly nowhere and struck the Minotaur's arms. It gave a slightly human scream as it dropped the axe. Jennifer looked up to see it had come from Raph and Leo. Aaliyah released her parachute first and kicked the Minotaur back hard. Leo and Raph then landed on either side of her and Donnie and Mikey behind her.

"Are you okay?" Raph asked her.

"I'll be okay." Jennifer replied and looked down a bit. "I'm sorry." She added softly.

Raph lifted her chin gently. "This wasn't your fault at all sweetie." He told her and then kissed her gently on the lips. Then he pulled away. "And we're going to kick this Minotaur's hide for trying to kill you."

Angel, April, Karai and Casey were immediately dealing with the Z-sec guys. Renet got a good look at the weird design on the floor. "This thing is set specifically to keep the labyrinth here." Renet announced. "Get rid of them and we banish the Minotaur and the labyrinth back to whatever place it held in the otherworld."

"Grand." Angel replied as she spun kicked two of the Z-sec guys away from her. "But if we do that won't we kill Jennifer and the turtles?"

"Yes." Renet answered. "But since this thing is what's keeping the labyrinth in our realm that means if they can find the right spot in the walls they can get out that way before we get rid of these guys."

"Red, you have to let Jennifer know that so they can get out of there and we can end this then." Casey said to his friend.

April nodded and took a step back, depending on Angel and Casey to keep her safe, and reached out to her blonde friend.

Leo and Raph charged the Minotaur, who lashed out and clocked both turtles across the face and making them stumble back. Mikey moved in with his nunchuck's and slammed the Minotaur in the face. It grunted in minor pain and then grabbed the orange masked turtle by the shoulders and tossed him into the bone throne.

Aaliyah and Donnie now moved in and Aaliyah tried to trip him but when her leg struck it didn't seem to hurt the Minotaur, who was already well muscled and apparently more so than the human legs let on. He slammed his fist hard into Aaliyah's chest. Donnie tried to slam his bo staff into the Minotaur's chest. It broke on impact. "Oh come on." Donnie moaned.

 _Jennifer, get the turtles and get out of there. There should be an illusory wall around there that will get you guys out. You have to hurry because we have seven Z-sec guys that are holding that labyrinth up and when we defeat them that stability is going to go._ The blonde heard April explain hastily.

"Forget the Minotaur guys, we have to go." Jennifer shouted. She started to rise but felt dizzy. Raph reached out and caught her in his arms, carrying her bridal style and causing her to blush slightly.

"How do we get out?" Aaliyah asked her.

"There should be an illusory wall we can use to get out." Jennifer said. "At least according to April. This place will fade away when the seven Z-sec guys are dealt with." She was still confused why that mattered.

Leo filled in the blank for her by saying, "And when they do that this we'll be trapped in here with no way to get home."

"How do we find the wall then?" Donnie asked.

"Leave that up to me." Mikey said.

"We're doomed." Raph moaned.

"We better hurry then." Aaliyah said as the Minotaur started to approach them.

"Follow me dudes and dudette." Mikey replied and the orange masked turtle ran. The others followed him and they could hear the Minotaur charging behind. He was looking around and then exclaimed, "There!" He ran full force and smacked right into the wall.

"You have got to be kidding me." Donnie now moaned.

Mikey moaned, "Ow." Right before he fell through that wall. The four turtles dove after Mikey and then as the Minotaur tried to follow them both Donnie and Leo hauled back and kicked the thing hard in the chest, sending it back into the labyrinth.

With the message delivered April dove back in and it was an easy matter to rid of the Z-sec guys. Even Renet got in a kill. They never stood a chance.

"You found it Mikey, way to go bro." Raph said.

Mikey rubbed his slightly aching head but none the less managed to reply with, "LTD, like a turtle do."

Leo laughed as he helped his youngest brother stand up. "Let's get Casey and the girls and head on home." The blue masked turtle said.

Once they got back to the lair Donnie treated Jennifer's head wound and declared she didn't have a concussion and once he stopped the bleeding he knew Jennifer's unique physiology would have her healed in about an hour.

"You sure you're okay?" Raph asked Jennifer.

The blonde nodded. "I'll be okay." She promised as she laid her head down on Raph's chest. Raph wrapped his arms around her and kissed the top of her head.

"So the plan failed." Null said. "The turtles still live."

"They do." Fulcanelli answered.

"If you want to get revenge on them before, you best get it done soon." Null advised as he stood up. "Remember, time is running short and we have to evacuate before time runs out." The horned man brought up his own small screen where both demon and sorcerer could just barely make out the approaching Triceraton armada.

Why does Null and the others feel they need to run? Where do they intend to run off too? Was Fulcanelli's plan just the start of something bigger? The adventure continues.


	60. Evacuation part 1

A/N: Working on the stories for Annihilation Earth (will be two parts) but I don't want to post that until we get closer to the new season because I don't want to take too much time off and I only have one follow up to the season finale so far. Also a reminder that May is a 2012 altered character from the Archie Ninja Turtles comics and isn't really mine.

Leo drove the Shellraiser with his brothers, Aaliyah, and their human friends in various positions in the vehicle. From the sensor position Donnie was tracking the whole reason they were out here; a Kraang energy signature.

"What do you think they're up to this time?" Raph asked as he looked over to Leo. "Think they're trying to bring in another army of Technodrome's Fearless?"

Leo shrugged though could not look back at his brother because he had to keep his eyes on the road. "I don't know Raph." He admitted. "The signatures are coming from a remote facility in the outskirts of the Bronx."

"I guess they could have bases anywhere." Jennifer remarked softly. "I mean what do we expect from them after discovering they had one set up in the Statue of Liberty." She rubbed her left arm absently. She was still sore from her recent escape from her father's labyrinth and the Minotaur. She still didn't know what her father got from that.

"Slimy little bastards." Angel noted. "All this to take over Earth, and for what?"

"Well you've never actually seen Dimension X." Donnie said to the Latina girl. "I mean the place is kind of bizarre. Gravity works completely different there and there are all of these bizarre creatures there. There's no way for humans or any Earth life form to breathe there, there's no sun…" The purple masked turtle cut himself off. "Not that what they're doing is right but to an extent it's hard to blame the Kraang for doing so."

"Can we go to Murakami's after this?" Mikey asked eagerly. "I could go for some pizza gyoza's right now."

No one really answered the youngest brother's question. Not that it was a bad idea but now wasn't really the time to be worrying about that. None the less Karai had wondered about taking up a job there to make some money to help out. Besides she wasn't sure staying in the sewers the rest of her life was really that feasible.

"Hey Donnie, you ever thought about upgrading the sensors to detect the differences between humans, Kraang, mutants and whatever else that it could come across?" Casey wondered absently.

"Yes." Donnie answered the masked vigilante simply. "The problem is that I can't get a Kraang to stand still long enough to get the details I need for it, and considering some of the unique properties of a mutant I can't guarantee that even between all of us and the Mutanimals I'd have enough samples to work with. Same thing with humans."

April reached over to gently lay her hand on her purple masked boyfriend's shoulder. "Hey, maybe we could at least see about collecting what we need from all of us." She suggested. "That way the next time we have to track one of our own we'll have an easier time doing it."

"Not a bad idea." Raph agreed even though the conversation half bored him. "I mean we just did have to figure out the best way to track Jennifer."

"Maybe I could find a way to get some of what you need." Renet suggested. "Granted Lord Simultaneous will be kind of annoyed with me for it but he'll get over it."

The blonde remembered something that her father had said before setting her loose in the Labyrinth, about being glad they didn't have anyone with knowledge of magic in their group and was about to voice the sensitive but possibly vital hole in their group when April suddenly recoiled and fell backwards. Luckily Jennifer and Casey were there to catch her before she hit the metal floor.

Donnie turned to look at her and asked, voice full of concern, "April, what's wrong?!"

April closed her eyes and tried to force the rapidly emerging headache down again. "I…I don't know…it feels like someone is trying to…to invade my mind or something." She took a deep breath. "I don't know."

"Is the Kraang causing this?" Angel asked.

"I don't see how." Donnie said worriedly. "They've never been fully aware of how to exploit April's powers. I don't even know if they're really aware of it."

Something about that statement bothered Jennifer. She took April's hand gently and tried to use her own untapped and relatively untrained powers to focus in on what was affecting her red headed friends. It was easy to find out, but she recoiled in pain herself. She gasped a bit but Angel was behind her before she could hit the metal wall herself.

"What the hell is going on around here?" Raph asked. He was already wondering if the Kraang was responsible for it but like Donnie didn't see how. The Kraang didn't even know about his blonde girlfriend's powers. "What about Fulcanelli, could he be responsible for this?"

"I…I guess." Donnie stuttered, getting more nervous by the moment.

"No." Jennifer gasped softly. "It's not the Kraang and it's not my father." She tried to sit up but still felt dizzy and was glad Angel was there to support her. "I know who's at the Kraang facility now."

"Who?" Aaliyah asked her friend.

Leaning her head against Casey's shoulder it was April who answered. "It's May." She revealed.

"Come again?" Angel asked.

"You mean that weird April clone that you guys tried to fight when I was at that hockey game." Casey clarified. "She nearly wiped you guys out with the empty controlled Kraang droids before Jennifer discovered her powers and combined with Red to stop it."

"That'd be the one." Raph agreed. "What is she trying to do now?"

"I don't know." April said. "I know she was trying to get me to combine my powers with hers." She took a deep breath to try to stabilize herself. "Maybe that's what she wants now. She might also be after Jennifer's."

"If she has access to more Kraang technology than she did last time, we have to stop her." Leo said as he narrowed his eyes. "Get ready guys, we have to stop her."

Most of the team exchanged worried looks. Granted they had about double the amount of people now than they had the first time they had fought May but if she had the same amount of droid's that she did last time it might not matter. "I can certainly grant that things have been more interesting since I joined your team." Karai said with a smirk.

Finding the Kraang base in the Bronx was easy enough and they parked the Shellraiser in front of the warehouse area. That made them a bit nervous considering that the last time they had dealt with May was with in a warehouse, though it had been abandoned. This place at least looked like it might have been working until recently.

"Do you think this May chick attacked a working Kraang facility this time?" Casey wondered.

"Well technically the first facility was working too." Donnie corrected the masked vigilante. "IT's just that it seems that May was awoken after we had to flee the city as a result of the second Kraang invasion and she took out that facility on her own." They started sneaking toward the entrance. "It's just that by the time we found it, it was months after the Kraang had been forced to abandon it because we had sent almost all of the Kraang to Dimensions X."

"We should have known that it wouldn't last." Raph said. They had figured that out even before Zog has shown up.

The wall seemed to be solid enough and the door didn't open up. That wasn't too much of an obstacle as most of them could jump it with ease, but they used the grappling hooks just to play it safe and scaled the wall.

Once they reached the other side they all noticed that it was still too quiet. "This is weird." Leo noted.

"A little too weird." Mikey echoed.

"Where do we go from here Red?" Casey asked her.

April frowned a bit as she looked around. "I'm not sure." She admitted softly. "I'm going to have to figure out where she is, and the only way I can do that is to…to delve into her mind."

"Is that dangerous?" Asked Angel. Her hand was on her bracelet and was ready to activate her Nightwatcher armor at a moment's notice.

April hesitated a moment. "Yes." She replied.

"There has to be another way then." Donnie said. "We can't put you in that kind of danger."

Jennifer thought a moment. "There is." She voiced as she looked around at all of their friends before ending her gaze at April and Raph. "April and I merge our powers together and track May's location in this facility."

"Is that dangerous to you?" Raph asked his girlfriend.

She fidgeted just a bit and moved a strand of her long blonde hair behind her ear. "A little bit." She confessed. "But not as dangerous as April doing it on her own. The two of them have basically the same power frequency wavelength but mine runs differently."

"It'd be like going through a backdoor." Angel realized with a snap of her fingers. "She wouldn't be able to do anything about it until it was too late."

"We can do it right here." April agreed. "Figure out where we're going before we move from this spot."

Raph and Donnie both looked to Leo. Neither liked the jeopardy their girlfriends were putting themselves into but none could see an alternative. But it was Leo's call. The blue masked turtle hesitated only an instant before deciding, "Let's do it."

The two girls sat on the ground facing each other, taking each other's hands and closing their eyes as they expanded their powers to find May in the large Kraang facility.

A few moments passed before Angel sighed. "I hate to feel useless or placed on the back burner." She admitted grudgingly.

"I hear that." The red masked turtle agreed.

Mikey looked around a bit, bored as well. Then he spoke up, "Um, dudes. I really don't think that will be a problem."

"Why do you say that?" Casey asked the orange masked turtle.

"Because we have company." Mikey announced and they turned to see a bunch of Kraang droids approaching. Like the last ones May was using these ones lacked the 'brainy toy surprise' as Raph had once called them. They were being telekinetically controlled. Then they started to blast at them.

Leo looked to Angel. "Protect April and Jennifer. Renet you stay here and help her too." She nodded, she was the logical choice since she could block any shot, and since she was wearing the armor it didn't really matter how she blocked it. He then looked to his brothers, Casey, Karai and Aaliyah. "We need to stop those Kraang droids." The six ninjas and the masked vigilante headed toward the Kraang droids and dove right into them.

"Hey, it's kind of better this way." Casey noted as he smacked two of them out his way. "We don't have to listen to their incessant Kraang chatter."

"Yeah, I don't know." Mikey noted as he slapped a few out of his way too. "I mean they also don't get the hilarious puns we sometimes come up with."

"If only we could shut out some other people's incessant chatter." Raph grumbled as he took out a couple of droids. From beside him Karai laughed just a bit as she took out a couple of her own opposing droids. Despite everything the two of them still had some similar attitudes.

"Is it me or does this seem easier?" Donnie asked Leo as he took out a couple of droids.

"Seems like it." Leo agreed. "Of course we do have some more help than we did last time, and we knew what to expect."

"Oh, so I'm just the help now?" Aaliyah asked her blue masked boyfriend teasingly as she took out a couple of droids herself.

"Not the only one." Raph said jokingly as he nodded toward Karai, who gave him a mock glare in return.

"Hey, you're a good sparring partner too." Leo tried to joke with Aaliyah but the white masked turtle's teasing still bought a blush to his cheek. Flirting was something he wasn't exactly an expert about.

"What matters is that it's easier." Casey said to Karai and his mutant friends. "And you can thank Casey Jones for his contributions to the cause."

Then three bio droids came from around the corner. They lacked heads as usually the Kraang and their little mini bot things controlled them. But aside from that they seemed perfectly functional. One of them ran forward and bowled right into the four turtle brothers.

"Do we thank Casey Jones for that contribution too?" Karai asked her boyfriend mock sweetly as she took out a couple of droids and then got ready to figure out how to deal with these things.

"Um, no." Casey decided with a shrug.

"Are you guys okay?" Aaliyah asked as she came to check on her boyfriend and his three brothers. "Has that happened before?"

"We're okay." Raph told the female turtle after a quick assessment of his recovering siblings.

"The bio droids have done that before." Donnie noted as he looked to Aaliyah. "But if you're asking if May controlled them last time, the answer to that is a big fat no."

"Lucky for us." Mikey added as he rubbed the back of his head with one hand and reached for his nunchuck with the other. "Hope I didn't suffer any brain damage."

"Who'd know the difference?" Raph asked, casually mocking as he stood up and recovered his sais.

With the bio droids now in play a few of the droids got past the frontal assault and started toward the four girls. Angel looked to Renet. "I'm going to try to stop them, keep April and Jennifer safe if they get by me." The armored vigilante said.

Renet nodded uncertainly. "Um, right. Try to keep them from getting by you." She said nervously.

Angel leapt into action and slammed her armored fists hard into one of the droids before she found herself with a new challenge. She was face to face with the bio droid that had charged right through the turtles. "It's like a headless blue gorilla." She noted to herself, trying to make her feel a bit better about this intimidating new challenge.

It turned around and unveiled the butt cannons. The Latina girl let out a laugh that was cut abruptly short as it rapid fired at her and hit her hard in the chest. Angel was sure that if she had not been in Nightwatcher armor she would have been injured or even killed. "Note to self; don't mock." She said and then dodged the next oncoming blast attack.

The last two approached Renet and she slammed her time scepter into the heads of one of them easily enough. But as she turned to do the same to the second one it caught her scepter's head and tossed her backwards. The apprentice time mistress wanted to take some consolation in the fact that it was coming for her instead of her two friends when a portal opened up behind them and three droids emerged from it.

"Looks like May has figured out how to use Kraang portal tech." Mikey noted with some dismay. None of them would reach the girls in time to help them.

"April!" "Jennifer!" The two turtle boyfriends tried to call out to their girlfriends but wasn't sure they could be heard.

Angel had clashed with the bio droid and was holding her own but the call from the turtles distracted her as she looked to see the droids moving in on the girls with their blasters raised. That moment of distraction was all it needed to clobber the armored vigilante in the back of the head.

Then out of nowhere both girls were up. April drew her tessens and Jennifer drew her batons and extended the blades. Both girls chopped a droid in half, an easier task without the Kraang in the middle sections. Then Jennifer slammed her other baton into the middle droids head as April took out the legs. They were all scrap metal on the ground.

April looked toward Donnie. "We know where to find May. We have to get going before she opens up the Kraang portal." She announced.

"Why would May be opening up a Kraang portal?" Aaliyah wondered.

"Maybe she established an alliance with them?" Karai suggested as she took out two more droids on her way to trying to drive her tonta into a bio droid, which promptly smacked her aside though the kunoichi rolled with the punch to land on her feet.

"There's only one way to find out." Leo said. He pulled out a few smoke bombs and tossed them to the ground so they could follow April and Jennifer into the Kraang facility. They only had minutes at most before the remaining droids and the three bio droids would catch up to them.

"What do we do once we find her?" Mikey asked as they followed April and Jennifer. "I mean the last time we came across her we barely got out by the skin of our teeth, and it wasn't because of our otherwise awesome ninjitsu skills."

"We have to shut down that Kraang portal." Donnie answered his orange masked younger brother. "Beyond that I don't know what we do either."

"Any chance of making her join our side?" Angel asked.

"Not likely." April responded.

"I did." Karai reminded the red head simply. "And if I did that for my father, surely for her sister…"

"She isn't my sister." April interrupted the kunoichi sharply. "She was just created from my DNA but was more genetically stable than the other clones the Kraang made of me."

"Even though she wasn't too stable mentally." Raph added.

"Though she was more powerful." Mikey noted absently, oblivious of the glares his brothers were sending him. "I mean without Jennifer combining her powers with April we'd have been wiped out."

"Shut up Mikey." Raph snapped as he slapped his youngest brother upside the head.

"We just have to do our best." Leo said. "Now let's get a move on team."

The two girls led the team to a large area that had the far wall basically dominated by a large Kraang portal, the largest they had seen to date. Part of Donnie idly wondered if they had this at their disposal why they had used a smaller portal at the TCRI building to bring the Technodrome to Earth a few years ago.

May turned to look at them. "I see you got past the guards, my sister." She said as she looked to April. "At least you and your little friends." She laughed. "I see that you've gotten a few more of them since we last saw each other."

"Since when did I become your 'sister'?" April asked May with a dark glare. "The last time you saw me you declared yourself better than me in every way."

"And I still am." May replied simply as she took a few steps forward. "But I feel your power has grown stronger even from here April O'Neill." She looked to Jennifer. "As well as the power contained in your little blonde friend." She cocked her head. "I still don't understand where you got your powers from, so similar to our and yet different in ways I have yet to figure out."

Jennifer had no intention of telling her that her powers seemed to have some kind of demonic origin. She didn't even like to admit that strong possibility herself.

"The game's over May." Leo stated as he pointed his katana toward her. "We won't allow you to bring anything from Dimension X to our world."

May laughed at him. "You think I'm looking to bring anything from Dimension X here?" She asked, sounding truly amused. "I think we have enough problems coming from that place."

"We can handle the Kraang." Donnie said defensively. "And, for better or for worse, you obviously can too."

May looked at the skeptically for a minute and then looked to April. "Perhaps your powers have not grown nearly as much as I thought they have, blood of my blood." She said to the red head. "Or else you would have divined the same thing I have."

"What are you talking about?" April asked her. Renet had a bad feeling that she knew. May was referring to the soon to be arriving Triceraton fleet that Lord Simultaneous had shown her and clearly the clone had decided she didn't think they could win.

"If you don't know, far be it from me to spoil anything for you." May said with a shrug. Then several dozen Kraang portals opened and out stepped out almost as many Kraang droids as there had been the last time they confronted her. And over a dozen bio droids on top of that. "Perhaps my drones will end you before you have to worry about it." She noted. "And if not then at least they will serve their intended purpose."

With that they started to attack. The five turtles and Casey dove right into the droids. Angel found herself having a 'rematch' with one of the bio droids, glad again for the extra strength that her Nightwatcher armor provided her. Karai allowed her snake form to come through as she slithered in between the bio droids, hoping to get them to destroy each other. The maneuver was only part successful.

April grabbed a hold of Jennifer's hand. "We have to stop whatever May is planning." She said to the blonde. "I can't do this without you."

Jennifer nodded. "Let's do it." She said to the red head and the two of them ran through the fight as they moved to intercept the doppelganger.

"As awesomely epic as this is, how much longer can we keep this up?" Casey asked Leo.

Karai looked to him. "We won't have to keep it up much longer." She said, her voice sounding a bit different as a mutant snake. "We're not alone anymore."

Before anyone could ask what the kunoichi meant one of the walls slammed open and in came in the Mutanimals, minus Rockwell and Slash as they were still recovering from Zog's assault. However in addition to Leatherhead, Pidgeon Pete, Mondo Gecko, Candy and Hawlita they had the newest members of their team; Miyamoto Usagi and Muckman.

"Let's waste some Kraang…or droids anyway." Muckman declared. With that the Mutanimals dove into the fight as well. Leatherhead and Muckman started to tear into the bio droids, which was a big hand to Angel, Mondo and Candy were working together against the droids as were Pete and Hawlita.

"It appears as if we came at the right time." Usagi noted as he helped Aaliyah take out a couple of droids.

"A few minutes earlier would have been okay too." Aaliyah conceded with a laugh.

"We'll take what we can get." Leo replied.

"May." April called out determinedly as she and Jennifer made their way to the top of the stairs. "This is it. We can't let you do what bring anything from that portal."

May looked to April and laughed. "You think I'm trying to bring something here?" She questioned and shook her head. "You're wrong, April O'Neil. I'm using this portal to leave this world."

"What?" Both girls asked shocked. That was not the answer they expected.

May laughed again. "As I say this isn't something I plan on letting any of you know about." She cocked her head a bit. "But, I give you a chance, my sister. Join me as I explore the world and you shall be spared." After a moment she conceded, "And you as well Jennifer. Your powers will be a welcome addition to ours."

"I don't think so." Jennifer said.

"Not a chance." April agreed.

"Suit yourself." May said and then launched a psychic attack at the girls, launching them off of the pad. Luckily it seemed as if Donnie and Raph had been keeping an eye on them as they immediately jumped up to catch their falling girlfriends.

She hadn't noticed however as May stepped through the portal. Before anyone could even think about following her the portal shut down and the console overloaded, preventing any hope of retrieval from that end. The bright side was that the droids and bio droids just stopped working and fell apart.

"Are you two okay?" Aaliyah asked the two girls as they gathered around Raph, Donnie, April and Jennifer.

"We're fine." Jennifer assured her.

"Where did May end up going to?" Mikey asked.

Donnie and April went up to examine the console but they quickly drew the same conclusion. "Wherever May went to she made sure to make sure that we couldn't follow her or figure it out." Donnie looked to the others. "The console is fried, the coordinates wiped."

"It's like she knew something we didn't." April said worriedly. "I just don't know what it was or what it means."

From the back of the group Renet swallowed nervously. She unfortunately had a pretty good idea.

Where did May go? Is she able to return if she is wrong? Is there any chance of bringing her to the good side? The adventure continues.


	61. Evacuation part 2

"You're sure this is a good idea?" Bishop asked neutrally. Null never the less could have sworn the man raised one of his eyebrows in doubt of this plan.

"You've always wanted to get a look at this." Null pointed out, completely amused as he watched Bishop's EDF men assemble the device under Doctor Malcolm's explicit instructions, that he intended to use to teleport himself; as well as his top allies, back to their own dimension, namely Hell itself.

"I feel as if this is a horrendous idea." Kitsune voiced as she stood in one of the darker corners. Her fox mutants were not with her, they were barely aware of her being a demon, let alone those she was now allying herself with. At least as far as they knew anyway. "I just escaped from that place."

"This is a different circumstance and you know it." Null reminded her simply. "And if what our seers have seen is wrong then we can simply return the way we came." He looked to the teleporter device. "Besides, even if we were to go with our plans right now this would have to be constructed anyway."

"I still don't understand why we don't use your forces to deal with these things…these Triceratons your seers are so panicked over." Bishop noted as he folded his arms over his chest. The stance and tone would have been rather intimidating to someone who was not a denizen of Hell itself. "The whole reason this alliance was sought out was to be prepared for the alien invasion's that would inevitably follow after the Kraang's."

"We are not prepared." Sergeant Thomas stated simply. "So many of our army was taken out by those meddlesome reptiles and their assorted allies during the gang war. While some of the minor demons are easy enough to replace, some of the tougher ones are not."

"We have in fact had to use resources we weren't ready to use in order to bring back a few of them that we will need to make this plan work." Doctor Malcolm added as he looked up from a clipboard, his milky white eye seemingly staring at nothing and yet Bishop was sure it was aimed at him.

"What of your pets?" Fulcanelli asked Kitsune. "Will they be coming with us?"

Kitsune frowned just a bit. "I doubt they would be so receptive to our destination." She admitted. "Ninjara herself is convinced of the evil of the underworlds." She shrugged lightly. "Rightly so admittedly. Still we will try."

"The teleporter will be constructed by the end of the hour." Doctor Malcolm reported. "It's a shame though that the girl with the eye of sarnath was able to escape. That would be the most ideal source for this project."

"If she hadn't escaped, we wouldn't need to be doing this." Bishop reminded him.

Null nodded. "Then it's time to move onto phase two of our plan."

The team sat around the living room eating pizza and having what was kindly called a strategy meeting. In fact they kept dwelling on a subject that was making Renet very uncomfortable. The question of what it was that had caused May to decide journeying to another dimension was the safest course of action. How could she admit that she had been told by Lord Simultaneous what was to come unless some massive miracle was to occur? The idea still made her stomach clench in fear and she wished she could tell the all, but she wasn't sure even if they knew what was to come that they could really stop it anyway.

"I still don't understand why May thinks I should have been able to sense it, or feel it, or whatever." April commented as she reached for a breadstick. They had ordered breadsticks and hot wings to go with the pizza this time. Raph had been kind of surprised to know that Jennifer liked hot wings.

"I keep thinking it has to be Kraang related, possibly another invasion." Donnie said as he took another slice of pizza. "What else could send May scurrying like that?"

"Can the Kraang?" Karai asked her smartest purple masked brother as she reached for her bottle of water. "I mean you told us what she did to those Kraang droids the first time out, and she clearly seems to have only gotten more powerful since that time."

Donnie thought a moment. "I don't know." He admitted reluctantly. "The limits to April's powers are still unknown to me, and May has exceeded any meager standards I've formed in the past."

Mikey tossed some pizza crust into a box, he was saving it specially for Pidgeon Pete the next time they crossed paths with the Mutanimals. Slash and Rockwell were recovering still in Donnie's lab but the rest were doing what they could; Leatherhead taking Slash's place as leader for the moment while their newest friend, the rabbit mutant and taker of Tiger Claw's tail Miyamoto Usagi had become the temporary new second in command.

Adelita sat on the couch eating a piece of pizza in relative silence. She figured in general it was best to let the fighters dominate the discussion. But one idea did occur to her. "What about the Triceratons?" She asked. They all seemed a little surprised she had spoken. "Could May have been fleeing them if the signal did really get out?"

"There's no way that signal could have gotten out." Raph tried to insist.

"But what if it did?" Angel questioned as she reached for one of the hot wings. "I mean I wasn't there but I have to wonder if there's any chance of that. Something as minor as a static burst could have gone out. If they're paying attention it would be all the invasion fleet needed."

Aaliyah thought a moment. "If it did get out, maybe that is the reason." She agreed. "I mean for whatever reason the Triceratons hate the Kraang and they might even be willing to exterminate their experiments."

"Um, isn't Red also a Kraang experiment of sorts?" Casey asked as he dropped a wing bone on his plate. "That would be a bad thing."

"He's got a point." Mikey managed to get out before grabbing for another two slices of pizza.

"I don't see how they would even know that." Raph argued the point as he tossed his pizza crust at Mikey, who caught it and tossed it to the pizza box. "I mean, so yeah April has some not normal human powers, as does May." He nudged Jennifer gently with his shoulder. "But so does my girl and they're not because of the Kraang."

Jennifer laughed a bit. "Yeah but I'm not sure the place I seemed to have gotten my powers from is any better." She replied. Though again no one had really given it voice everyone was starting to think the same thing; Jennifer's powers had a demonic origin to them.

"Dudes, it's almost time for the penultimate episode of Crognard the Barbarian." Mikey announced happily as he reached for the remote. "Are we done here?"

Renet was more than eager to change the subject as well before she found herself saying things she shouldn't. "Yeah, let's put this on the back bummer for now." She voiced.

"Back burner." Aaliyah corrected the apprentice time mistress.

Mikey flipped on the TV but before anyone else could decide what to say the TV went out at the exact same time as it seemed all of the power went out. The orange masked turtle gasped and exclaimed, "Ice Cream Kitty!" before running off to prevent her from melting.

"Why'd we lose power?" Raph asked Donnie as he stood up. "I thought short of a city wide blackout that was supposed to be impossible."

"It should be." Donnie agreed. He stood up as well. "The Shellraiser has an independent power source, maybe I can figure out what happened." April set her half eaten pizza down and went to help him out.

Renet followed Mikey into the kitchen to see him pull out Ice Cream Kitty and place her into the same mini cooler he had used to take her to the farmhouse after the second Kraang invasion, surrounded by frozen pizzas and some ice. He looked to Renet. "Any ideas why the power could have gone out?" He asked her.

The apprentice time mistress shook her head. She was aware of one thing but the problem there was that they wouldn't be here at the lair right now if that had been the case. "Not clue." She admitted honestly, something she was glad she could do. Rather anyone sensed it or not honesty was becoming something of a rare commodity since Zog had shown up on Earth.

Everyone sat around the garage door side of Donnie's lab as he ran his search on the Shellraiser's independent operating system. "Looks like the electricity is being drawn to one place." Donnie announced after a moment of typing and scrolling. "And the destination in question is none other than the EDF location where they were holding Angel to test the eye of sarnath."

"Good." Angel noted with some glee. "I can get some payback on those demon loving EDF bastards." It made Adelita wonder if Bishop knew who he was truly working with and if so why he would choose to work with creatures that seemed pretty intent on destroying the planet as they knew it.

"Why would they be drawing so much electricity?" Jennifer wondered.

"Maybe bringing another demon into our world?" Casey suggested.

"Don't know about you Jones, but I've never seen Fulcanelli or anyone else for that matter draw electricity to summon those freaks." Raph noted.

"I've never seen it either." Jennifer agreed. In truth though it wasn't spoken about all of them assumed the lithe blonde had seen her father summoning more demons than she would admit, perhaps even more so than she could remember.

"Well the Hell Hunter that Mondo, Candy and I fought at the power plant did use electricity." Donnie reminded them all. "Although that was as a weapon and a way to defend itself from our attacks. And it didn't disrupt the entire city either to do it."

"It does not matter who or what is responsible for this and why they are doing it." They heard Splinter say from behind them. "What matters is stopping them. They must not be allowed to bring any more demons into this world."

"Master Splinter is right guys." Leo declared. "We have to go over there and stop Null and his cronies from doing what they're planning."

"Take care of Ice Cream Kitty." Mikey requested of Renet, who nodded in agreement. She thought it was the least she could do. Besides, she really did like the Neapolitan cat.

Adelita waved goodbye at them as they all entered the Shellraiser. Casey, Aaliyah and Angel waved back. Then the Shellraiser pulled out and drove through the tunnel and toward the surface.

The drive was quick but kind of chaotic as it seemed most of the city was freaked out over the massive power outage. Only Leo's driving skills got them there in one piece though someone that was driving erratically (no one knew if it was intentional or not) had hit the Shellraiser and Jennifer's arm hit one of the console's hard enough to cause her to lose feeling in her arm for a few minutes. That annoyed Raph and it was a good thing they couldn't stop for him to express that feeling.

Donnie did a quick scan of the EDF building. "I don't see any guards on the outside and very few on the inside." He told them.

"Dude, Z-sec's aren't going to show up on that." Mikey reminded his purple masked brother. "They don't give off any body heat."

"That…" Donnie started to protest before his younger brother's words caught up with him and he gasped a bit. "Is actually a very astute point Mikey."

Mikey seemed proud of himself. "All of my years reading comics have allowed me to draw that very aloof point." He said happily.

Karai sighed. "No, it's astute, not aloof." She corrected her youngest brother. "As for anything else, well let's just say that even a stopped watch is right twice a day."

That got Mikey thinking again, confused over her statement and Raph reached over and smacked him in the back of the head. "Forget it genius, we have bigger fish to fry." He reminded them all.

"Raph is right." Leo agreed. "Let's move people."

"Time to show them the epicness of Casey Jones." The masked vigilante declared.

"Right on Jones." Karai agreed and drew her tonta.

"Hear, hear." Angel agreed as she twisted the bracelet to activate her Nightwatcher armor.

The team took one of the side doors and made their way up the stairs. They encountered a few groups of Z-sec's as they made their way up but those were just as quickly taken care of by various team members, making Jennifer remember what Mikey had once said about beating a video game boss on easy.

Reaching the roof of the building was easy. On a platform surrounded by two large metal beams of some sort they found Null flanked by Bishop, Fulcanelli, and Kitsune on one side. The other side had Thomas and Malcolm, the latter working a control device of some sort in his hands.

In front of them stood several of the large creatures that Mikey had at one point coined Hell Knights. It was apt considering the three figures that appeared a moment later. The team thought they and the Mutanimals had beaten these things already; all three Hell Hunters. Behind the demon horde stood Ninjara and Alopex, looking very uncertain about this entire thing.

"Welcome to the roof of my building." Bishop said idly to the team. "I see you have shown up just as we expected."

"We won't let you bring anything here Bishop, Null." Leo stated as he aimed his katana blades at them.

"Because you've been so successful with that up to this point." Kitsune pointed out mockingly with a light laugh. "If you were that good I wouldn't be here right now, nor would my little friends." She indicated the two fox mutants.

"Would it interest you to know that we aren't trying to 'bring' anything here?" Bishop asked them. "Quite the opposite in fact."

"You're leaving?" Jennifer questioned incredulously as she glanced at April, who wore that same confused expression as when they had seen May leaving through the portal rather than bringing something to Earth.

"Surprised child?" Fulcanelli retorted to his daughter amused.

"Still we wouldn't mind some nice presents on our way out." Null reflected. "Hunters, bring us their heads on a silver platter." He ordered.

"Always something with these guys." Angel reflected.

The Hell Knights surged toward them; as did the floating Hell Hunter and the brutish Hell Hunter that Jennifer remembered Raph and Slash had faced the night Hector mutated himself and tried to critically injure the red masked turtle. The blonde also noted that Ninjara and Alopex followed them but very cautiously, almost reluctantly.

What Donnie thought odd however was how the very same Hunter he had faced at the power plant stayed back away and it started to draw electricity from around them and then start to direct it toward the platform that Bishop and the demons were standing on.

"Leo, I think Null is sapping the city's electricity in order for that Hell Hunter to use it to power up that teleporter and do whatever it is they're trying to do." The purple masked turtle called out their fearless leader as he indicated the hunter.

"Donnie, you and I need to stop that thing." The blue masked turtle declared. He looked to the rest of the team. "You guys take out the rest of these demons." With that the blue and purple masked turtles jumped over the hoard, using a couple of the Hell Knight's heads as springboards

"You heard Fearless." Raph said to his brother, Aaliyah and their human friends. "Let's do it." He twirled his sais in his hands as he started forward. He and Mikey found themselves facing up against the floating Hunter.

Angel and Karai found themselves against the last hunter. It glowed red for a moment and then surged forward. It slammed into Karai hard and though she was able to recover from the slide she could feel it had caused her nose to bleed. It moved to slam its fist down on the kunoichi but Angel was there in her armor and caught it, though barely.

That left the three semi trained in some fashion but still just human companions to deal with the Hell Knights now approaching them as well as Aaliyah. The red head noticed out of the corner of her eye that Alopex hesitated just a moment before trying to jump in but was stopped by a hand on her shoulder from Ninjara and she swore the brown fox mutant told the arctic fox mutant to wait. Then the view was lost as a Hell Knight now tried to slash her.

"I don't like this." Ninjara said. "Why was Kitsune so insistent to leave only to go back now? If they're going back then why do Null and the rest of them still feel the need to kill the turtles and all of their friends?"

Alopex hesitated a moment. "Because…." She tried to justify and then found like her companion she couldn't do so. "I don't know." The two fox mutants looked to the battle.

Casey was using his skates to try to dodge the Hell Knights. "This would be so metal in any other place." He said.

"Maybe next time Null will do this in a more open space just for you Jones." April retorted sarcastically as she tried to take the arm off of the Hell Knight that had attacked her and was rather annoyed to discover her tessen's barely scratched through the demon's thick arm.

Aaliyah was using her bunrei's to fend off two Hell Knights. She had to use both of her weapons in order to do anything significant to her demonic adversaries. "This is not going as well as I'd like." The white masked female turtle lamented.

"No kidding." Jennifer agreed as she used her batons, the blades already extended, to attack a Hell Knight. Like April she was finding her weapon to be a bit less than effective. "These brutes are so thickly muscled it's ridiculous."

Casey shot one of the cherry bomb taped hockey pucks at one of the Hell Knights only for it to explode almost harmlessly against it. "It took quite a few of us just to take down one of these freaks." Casey noted. "How are we supposed to take down more than one spread out?"

As Angel was struggling with the Hell Hunter Karai leapt up and kicked it in the head. It stumbled back only two steps but it was enough to get the pressure off of her armored friend. "Any bright ideas Nightwatcher?" The kunoichi asked her.

"That depends." Angel replied and tried to ram her armored fists straight into the things chest cavity, where it seemed she could just make out where the thing's heart would be if demon's had one. She just got in but not far enough before it slammed its fists into her chest hard enough to make her fall back. "Okay, scratch that."

Mikey had the idea to use his kusarigama chain to try to bring their floating adversary down to their level but even as the chain wrapped around the demon the orange masked turtle knew he would be too heavy. Combine that with the fact it broke the chain easily and that idea flopped.

Raph jumped up and kicked the demon in the chest but it just growled and slammed the red masked turtle down onto the roof hard.

"This just doesn't feel right." Ninjara said to Alopex. "Whatever else they may or may not have done, this isn't something they deserve."

"Are we even having any effect Donnie?" Leo asked his smartest brother as he tried to hack away at the Hell Hunter with his katana. It was doing some intermittent damage but it seemed every few chops an small shield was coming up to protect the demon and allow it to heal. He remembered Donnie, Mondo and Candy describing just that when they faced the demon at the power plant.

Donnie shrugged. "I don't know Leo." He admitted. "It's certainly not enough damage." He looked around a bit. "I can't even guarantee that this demon isn't charging that device even as it's fighting us."

One of the Hell Knights grabbed Jennifer by the waist with one of its massive arms and lifted her up, squeezing hard. The blonde gasped in pain, sure that it was only moments away from snapping her hip bones into multiple pieces and possibly even fracture her spine. In desperation she drove one of her batons into its eye and the demon roared in pain before tossing her hard. The landing broke one of her left arm. Through the haze of pain she saw the Hell Knight walking towards her and understood that while her arm would heal itself in a matter of hours thanks to the mystery regeneration effects she had it wouldn't matter much if this demon were to step on her.

"Ah, hell no!" Raph exclaimed and tried to go help only to be struck in the shell by a fireball from the Hell Hunter he and Mikey faced. The shell took the brunt of the attack so the red masked turtle wasn't that hurt but it was enough of a distraction that he couldn't get to his girlfriend.

Alopex leapt out, landing behind her. That lasted only a moment before she jumped again and drove both of her powerful hind legs right into the Hell Knight's chest. Ninjara was behind her lightning fast, her sword drawn as she drove it right through the back of the demon's head. Both Alopex and Jennifer could see the tip of her sword sticking out of the eye socket from the missing eye Jennifer had given it. In moments it dissipated into nothing.

"One down but too many to go." Alopex noted as the arctic fox mutant helped Jennifer to stand. "I wish we had a better idea of how to get rid of these things faster."

Donnie gasped. "Wait a minute." He said. He looked to Leo. "Keep this thing…whatever you want to call it." At a nod from his oldest brother he dashed over to Karai. "Help everyone else with those demons." The kunoichi nodded and dashed off herself as Donnie looked to Angel. "Piss that thing off and get it to follow you."

"What are you hoping for?" Angel asked him.

"I've felt how hard that bruiser thing hits." Donnie told her quickly. "And I think that while none of us can get past that invulnerability field that other Hunter gives off, I think his own 'brother' can."

Angel shrugged. She wasn't as sure but that was enough for her to try it. "Let's do it then." She replied. She turned to the Hell Hunter and rushed right over to it, giving it as hard of an uppercut as her Nightwatcher armor would allow, and then drove a knee hard into its stomach before bringing her elbow down hard onto its head. She then jumped back a couple of feet. "You know, if you were anything other than some brutish demonic freak that would have taken you down." She commented annoyed.

In response the Hell Hunter roared at her and tried to hit her, which she dodged. It raised its arms and a red aura seemed to envelope it. As he recovered Raph noticed this and remembered from his and Slash's first battle against it that it was powering up what he thought of as the demon's berserk mode.

Angel raced away from it as fast as she could, heading toward the electricity wielding invulnerable Hell Hunter muttering, "A rocket pack would be great right about now." Leo saw her coming and did his best to distract his Hell Hunter until the last minute when he leapt out of the way just as Angel also leapt over the Hell Hunter. The one chasing her moved to punch, too late to realize the armor clad girl had jumped out of range of the attack. Hell Hunter one's fist slammed right into the chest of Hell Hunter two and it dissipated the field around it and sent it flying into one of the stands surrounding Kitsune, Fulcanelli and the other three EDF guys.

"Leo, take it out now!" Donnie exclaimed. "Just like Ninjara did with that Hell Knight!"

"On it." Leo confirmed as he aimed his katana blades at the demon's face. He noticed only a moment later that he was joined by the aforementioned brown fox mutant as Ninjara also plunged her sword into the Hell Hunter's head. Only the metal of the objects stopped anyone from seeing three small sword puncture wounds around the demon's head.

"Oh, wait a moment." April started to say but it was too late. While that Hell Hunter dissipated as all of these demon's seemed to do the electricity seemed to get absorbed into the machine.

"Not the way we were trying to make it work." Null noted with amusement. "But it got the job done." He laughed as he looked at all of five turtles, the two fox mutants that Kitsune had made, and the their three human companions. "See you in your nightmares, assuming you last that long. Fools." Then they all vanished.

Donnie and April both started toward the console near the machine in an effort to see if they could figure out what had happened to them. Donnie only got a quick look at it before the console shorted out.

"We're not out of the woods yet." Aaliyah reminded them all. There were still two Hell Hunters remaining as well as a few Hell Knights. "I know we haven't had much luck against these things today but we can't let them stay in the city either."

That quickly became a non issue. The remaining demons disappeared thy way most of them seem to show up, teleporting out rather than in, back to whatever destination they called home. "What the shell man?" Mikey wondered.

"They were trying to return back to the hell dimension that they came from." Ninjara told them, though she kept a certain amount of distance from the team. Alopex did as well, standing beside the brown fox. "I don't know why though."

"They wouldn't be the only ones." Casey remarked. "First Red's freaky twin and now them."

"She wasn't my twin Casey." April said to him icily.

"Any idea where they went?" Leo asked Donnie.

"They designed this console to go out pretty quickly." Donnie informed them. "Still I'm able to get a basic set of coordinates. One of them I recognize, but I don't recognize the other."

"What do you recognize?" Jennifer asked Donnie, only limping slightly. Raph was already by her side to help her in case she lost her balance.

"What I recognize are spatial coordinates. They were teleporting to Mars." The purple masked turtle answered as he took out his T-phone and snapped a picture of the readings on the console. "I don't recognize the other set though. Maybe we can find out at the lab."

"A place we will not be going with you to." Alopex said firmly. "We were already uncertain about Kitsune saying you guys were supposed to be our enemies, but we're not really convinced that you're our allies either."

They all kind of exchanged glances before Jennifer spoke up. "I understand that trust isn't built in a day, on either side." She knew none of them would exactly forget that they had started out as their enemies either. Of course so had Karai and Slash among others. "Thank you though, for rescuing me when you didn't have too."

Aaliyah took a piece of paper from the ground, one that she suspected might have been from that scientist Malcolm, and jotted down their T-phone numbers. "I hope we can change your minds in time, the way things have been going we could use all of the help we can get." She offered them the paper which Ninjara took. "Those are our numbers, please feel free to contact us if you would like to talk or anything."

"I have a feeling we'll see each other again." Ninjara said. "There are only so many mutants in this city after all." With that the two fox mutants turned and leapt away.

"Are we sure letting them go is a good idea?" Raph questioned.

"They have to come to us in their own time, in their own way, Raph." Karai said to her hot headed younger brother. "Just as I had too."

"Let's hope it doesn't take them as long." Leo said as he looked around at the team, basically his family. "Let's go home."

They returned the lair still discussing what had happened. It was there that they got an answer about the second coordinates from Renet. "These are time coordinates." The blonde apprentice time mistress revealed to her friends. "Whatever Mars they went too, it's not the one from this time period."

"Do you know where they went?" Adelita asked her as she sat by Leo.

Renet shook her head. "Not precisely. But just judging from these coordinates I would estimate at least 100 years in the future, probably more." She surmised.

"Wait a minute." Raph interjected. "How are they going to Mars over a century in the future and still call it Hell?"

Everyone frowned as they realized that it didn't seem to make sense.

"What I want to know is, why exactly did they leave in the first place?" April wondered. "Whatever they think they know, is it the same thing that May thought she knew?"

Renet hid her frown, again reminded what she knew could very well happen against what she hoped wouldn't, for the sake of her friends and…and possibly even her life here if she were honest with herself.

"Whatever the case, we should be prepared for anything." Splinter said to them all. "Whatever may be about to go down has sent two of our adversaries fleeing into the night, and one of those was none other than a very powerful demonic faction."

"For something like that, whatever they expect has to be catastrophic." Adelita said as she sat in between her little sister and the now unarmored Angel. "Something that we just might not be prepared for."


	62. Earth's End?

Sirens blared as the team drove the streets in the Shellraiser. "Wow, the Triceraton sound so cool." Casey noted with a mock swing of his fist. His other held a rope on the ceiling like one would find on a subway to maintain their balance. April, Jennifer and Angel held one as well. "I wish I could have fought a real life dino dude."

Jennifer shook her head and rubbed the back of her neck with her free hand. Between that incident and the recent incident with the labyrinth she was feeling a bit sore. Apparently her mystery healing powers didn't help with that. "No you don't Casey." She tried to say. "Trust me it's not fun."

"Yeah right." Raph remarked. "That dino dude would have stomped you into a Casey puddle in about five second flat."

"Whatever Raph." Casey shot back. "Casey Jones eats dinosaur meat for breakfast."

"I would have been able to take it no problem." Angel bragged. It might have been more believable but only because of the Nightwatcher armor and the eye of sarnath that enhanced the Latina girl had taken possession of thanks in a way to some relatively unknown alien race. "But I think I'll skip the dino meat, that just sounds wrong."

"Ugh." April seemed to agree with Angel's assessment. "I'm just amazed by the fact that there are more aliens out in the universe besides the Kraang and that one who was trying to find the eye of sarnath originally."

Donnie had been furiously typing at his station and now interrupted, "I hate to break up the conversation guys but someone has been following us for the last five blocks or so."

"That's weird." April said as she walked over toward Donnie's station. "I don't sense anyone at all." Mikey too had deserted his station to take a look at what his older brother was talking about.

"See for yourself." Donnie replied as he brought up the camera image of a black vehicle following them.

The vehicle pulled up beside them and the window came down just as Casey and Angel joined them. They saw the face of a Kraang droid to which Casey stated, "It's a Kraang."

From the driver's screen Donnie said, "Stay on him Leo." To his oldest brother. He looked to the passenger seat where he exchanged nods of agreement with his girlfriend Aaliyah as the vehicle the Kraang were driving was pulling ahead of the Shellraiser.

They followed the vehicle into what seemed like a dead end and the five turtles and four humans rushed out of the vehicle to see what had happened.

"He's gone." Leo noted.

April noticed the writing on the wall, literally. "Check it out." She said. "Turtles, 3117 Bayfront Street. Midnight." She read aloud. Below that was a chess piece that Donnie, Leo, Jennifer, Aaliyah and April recognized as a bishop.

Mikey clearly did not recognize it "What's that supposed to be? A logo?" He asked.

"It's a chess piece." Leo answered. "A bishop."

"A bishop?" Angel questioned. "As in that same guy who kidnapped you guys in that subway tunnel?"

"He wasn't a Kraang Angel." Jennifer reminded her softly. "He has to be human, though I don't know then why he's allied with two demons and a man who basically controls demons." She didn't voice the obvious that that man in question was her father.

"So it's a trap then." Aaliyah guessed as she looked to Leo.

"Possibly." Leo agreed with the white masked turtle. "But what choice do we have?"

At midnight they made their way to Bayfront Street. "For the record I still think this is a terrible idea Leo." Raph said. "It's got to be a trap, just as Aaliyah already said."

"Something's up and I'm going to find out what." Leo replied as he looked back at Raph.

"From everything you guys have said, a Kraang just doesn't approach us out of nowhere." Angel agreed. "Not without some kind of plan."

That caused Aaliyah to purse her lips a moment. "A Kraang doesn't just show up alone simply for some insidious plan. They're usually more…crafty than that." She noted. "But still…"

"Dudes." Mikey interrupted from hanging above them. "This is the same meat warehouse where we fought Tiger Claw." He announced and Jennifer remembered them telling her about this place, where Tiger Claw had outwit the turtles and captured Karai to take her to the Shredder after she had realized Splinter was her father and the masked villain had lied to her. "Come on, I know a back entrance."

He hopped down and they followed him but not before Angel got out the unanswered question of, "How does he know where the back entrance is?"

Once inside they were on the rafters and they saw the single Kraang droid pacing below then, waiting. Leo tried to keep them quiet when with a growl Casey ran forward with a hockey stick ready to attack despite the blue masked leader's call of "Casey, stop."

"Goongala!" Casey yelled out and tried to hit the droid but he dodged and it connected with the floor. The droid than used the beef carcass to hit Casey back twice where he hit two more before falling on his face.

With their cover blown Leo drew his katana, Raph drew his sais, Donnie drew his bo staff, Mikey drew his nunchucks, Aaliyah drew her bunrei's and the five turtles attacked.

Jennifer drew her batons and Angel was about to activate her armor when the Kraang droid advised, "Do not do this." That surprised the blonde and she held up her hand to at least stop Angel from jumping in.

April and Leo kneeled down to check on Casey as the other four turtle moved to attack. They were joined a moment later by Angel and Jennifer.

Raph tried to slash him with his sais only to be knocked away. Aaliyah followed suit only for the Kraang droid to take her wrist and toss her in the opposite direction as the red masked turtle. He then used the hockey stick to knock back both Donnie and Mikey.

As Casey was getting up Leo saw this and exclaimed, "Mikey!" Before moving in to attack the Kraang droid now.

"I am not here to fight you." The Kraang droid said to Leo. This struck Jennifer as weird.

"Too late for that." Leo replied as he surged forward to attack him. The Kraang droid back flipped into the next room and the blue masked turtle followed. He dodged multiple attacks from the katana before finally catching one each in his hands. "That's impossible." Leo said right before being kicked in the chin and falling backwards. The rest of the team was just coming in now.

The Kraang droid swirled the katana's and then implored, "Turtles, refrain from attacking. Believe me when I say that I am not your enemy." With that he presented the katana blades back to Leo. He took back his katana and it was clear that they were all ready to listen.

"You may call me by my Earth name, Bishop." The Kraang droid said.

"Wait, you look just like a Kraang." Casey said.

"And we've already met a Bishop in the EDF and he'd a major ass." Angel added with a small narrowing of her eyes.

"I was the one who invented this body, the other Kraang copied me." Bishop explained and looked to Angel. "I do not know what to tell you where that is concerned. I am a member of the Utrom tribe, a small group of Kraang defectors. We broke away from the Kraang hive mind many centuries ago." No one knew when Bishop and pulled back the clothing in the stomach area to reveal the Kraang within.

"Fascinating. It makes sense that the Kraang share a hive mind." Donnie noted and added, "A really stupid hive mind." That caused Angel to laugh a little and even Jennifer had to giggle a moment before stopping herself.

"I have broken my Utrom vow not to intervene in earthly matters," Bishop continued as if Donnie had not spoken and the two girls had not found it amusing. "But I must warn you; the Triceratons are coming."

"So much for the signal not getting out." Aaliyah noted dryly and with a roll of her eyes. "Figures."

"The Triceratons, as in plural?" Leo asked and then changed the subject. "But we stopped the beacon."

"No, they are coming." Bishop insisted as he turned his back on the team. "And they are carrying enough fire power to destroy the entire solar system."

Mikey gulped nervously and asked, "Can you repeat that last part?"

"Does he have too?" Jennifer wondered softly. She had heard it loud and clear and was not sure they needed to hear it again.

"The news gets worse." Bishop revealed as he turned back to them, "The Kraang have finally finished the Technodrome and are about to invade once more."

"You have any more terrible news Bishop or is that it?" Raph questioned a bit annoyed as he felt Jennifer's hand on his arm though the red masked turtle wasn't sure if she was trying to keep him calm or trying to draw strength from him to calm herself. Perhaps both.

Bishop started to prod a carcass with a butcher knife. "If the Triceratons arrive when the Technodrome rises, they will hone in on this planet," As he spoke he used the butcher knife to slice the carcass. "And vaporize it."

"Swell." Angel noted sarcastically.

"Sorry I asked." Raph agreed.

"Bishop, why do the Triceratons hate the Kraang?" April asked him.

"For millennia the two species have fought over Dimension X. The Kraang use their intelligence to battle their foes, while the Triceratons rely on their brute strength and cunning. It seemed the Triceratons would win." Bishop started to explain. "But the Kraang used the most powerful weapon in the universe, a black hole generator that wiped out the Triceratons entire planet. Only a single Triceraton fleet survived. They vowed vengeance."

"The battle may have ended but the war has not. It still rages across Dimension X." Bishop finished. He removed the sunglasses he was wearing and asked, "Now, shall we begin?"

Splinter looked in on the still recovering Slash and Rockwell. He then turned to Leatherhead who was sitting on the steps with Adelita beside him, offering what little comfort she could. Karai was sitting in one of the chairs reading. "They are still asleep." The rat master announced. "Do not worry Leatherhead, they will heal in time. But they need rest."

Leatherhead turned to him. "Thank you great Splinter." He glanced at Adelita since he knew she also had had helped with that. "For caring for my friends."

Splinter nodded in acknowledgement and Adelita smiled a bit as Mikey announced, "We're back everyone." As they all came in the orange masked turtle added, "And we brought a new pal." Karai looked up startled as he revealed Bishop.

It was a good thing that Adelita had already gone over to give her little sister a welcome home hug because that meant she was out of harm's way for what happened next. "Kr-Kr-Kraang!" Leathehead stuttered out and the growled before charging toward him.

Everyone dodged out of his way and Leatherhead even heard April get out a, "Wait." But ignored it as he roared and tried to snap into the droid with his powerful jaws.

"I do not want to fight you creature." Bishop said to Leatherhead but the mutant alligator was not listening as he tried to attack again but the Utrom avoided it. He tried to attack again and Bishop got a hold of his neck and tossed him onto the ground.

With a roar Leatherhead was on his feet and started toward Bishop. Mikey was in front of him with his hands raised. "Leatherhead calm down dude." Mikey implored. His older brothers and Aaliyah were barely managing to hold Leatherhead back by pressing into his stomach, all of them grunting a bit with exertion at the effort it was taking. Adelita was now by Angel and Jennifer. "It's okay, this is Bishop. He's a good Kraang. An Ulon."

"Utrom." Donnie managed to correct his younger brother. "He's not like the others."

That seemed to calm Leatherhead down a little. Still he stated, "I do not trust him."

"I think I'm going to have to second that one." Karai agreed.

Adelita didn't want to point out how many people wouldn't trust them, based just on their appearances. It didn't make that judgement right in this case either.

"We've got to trust him for now L.H." Mikey said, giving his friend a consoling hug. "He's totally cool, he's going to help us fight the Kraang." The sunglasses made it hard to be sure of anything, not to mention the eyes on the droid really meant nothing, but as Mikey had just set, they had to trust him for now.

They went to Donnie's lab so that Leo could explain his plan. On the chalkboard was a wave that was supposed to resemble the water and a badly made Technodrome.

"Maybe next time they should let do the drawing." Karai said to Adelita, looking serious but her voice belying the humor behind it. "At least you can draw."

"Alright, here's the plan." Leo said as he looked to them all. "Raph, Donnie, Mikey, Aaliyah and Leatherhead." Leo placed another badly made sub under the wave." You take the sub. Infiltrate and stop the Technodrome before it launches." He moved the Technodrome above the wave. "And if it does launch, the rest of us will take it out in the turtle blimp."

"The Technodrome?" Splinter questioned. Adelita didn't even know what that was. Not that Angel or Jennifer knew much better. Even Aaliyah only had a vague idea. "Leonardo, what is going on here?"

"You're just going to have to trust me when I say the whole world is at stake." Leo said as he looked to their father. They didn't have time to rehash Bishop's explanation if what they were told was true. "And only we can save it."

Splinter exchanged looks with his son. "Go then. Adelita and I will help Slash and Rockwell. If you need me, I will stay close to the cheese phone." Splinter declared.

Jennifer watched from the platform on the blimp as the turtle sub descended into the depts., which included her boyfriend. She turned as Leo spoke. "Alright, let's hope Raph's team can take down the drome."

"And if they cannot" Bishop added as blue masked turtle crossed his arms over his chest. "We must destroy it. At any cost." The blimp floated higher to reveal the explosives attached to it.

With no signs of the creature with an infatuation for the turtle sub the bottom hatch opened and the four turtles swam out and towards a hatch for the Technodrome and dropped in silently. That none the less didn't stop the Technodrome from rising.

"Oh, no." Casey gasped as beside him Angel fingered her bracelet, ready to activate the Nightwatcher armor. "That is so awesome." The Technodrome continued to rise. "And terrifying." The hockey playing vigilante added.

Leo called into his T-phone, "Raph you guys have two minutes to blow that thing before we do."

"Back off man." Raph replied. "We're heading toward the core now Fearless." The red masked turtle then disconnected.

The five moved stealthily. Raph noticed the tripwire and said, "Head's up guys." But not in enough time to stop Mikey from placing his foot on the tripwire and setting of alarms. Mikey laughed embarrassed, Aaliyah rolled her eyes and Raph growled in annoyance.

From the walls large screw like objects began to come down and then unfolded with wheels. Raph leapt toward them as they started to blast at the four turtles and Leatherhead. Raph took one out and from the side came two more. One shot out a tentacle at Mikey's throat while the other shot one at Aaliyah.

The white masked female turtle used one bunrei to intercept it and another to chop it off. The orange masked turtle was not as lucky as he got shocked for a moment before Raph destroyed that device. "Damn Roadkill Rodney's." Mikey declared as he sunk to his knees and tried to shake off the electrical shock. Leathehead helped his friend up.

Raph took down another on the wall and then jammed his sai into the alarm panel. "Finally I can hear myself think." Raph reflected looking behind him and asking, "Where to Leatherhead?"

The mutant alligator pointed in the direction they were going. "This way." They continued on. Raph jumped on one of the Rodney's and Mikey jumped on the red masked turtle's shoulders and they fought on until two bio droids came down the corridor. They both let out a scream of shock and then jumped off just as the bio droid crushed their ride.

They ran by Leatherhead who was pulling apart one of them when the two turtles dashed by. "Run this way." Mikey called.

Aaliyah turned to see the bio droids. "Shoot." She murmured and went after them. But from around that corner came what could only be called a two headed hydra like creature with Kraang on top. "Okay, that way. That way." Mikey said.

That led backwards where there were now five Kraang droids. "Turtle and alligator mutants." One of them stated. They were raising their blasters and pointing them. "You will raise that which is known as forelimbs." The Kraang hydra thing popped up behind them.

"No retreat, no surrender." Leatherhead stated and tried to charge that Kraang droid who in turn used a retractable prod to shock him down. The four mutant turtles raised their hands up. "Now this is definitely bad." Raph said.

Meanwhile and the turtle blimp was heading straight for the Technodrome. It exploded on impact and hovering nearby was Leo, Bishop and the others. "I told you it wouldn't be big enough to bring down the ship." Casey remarked. "Casey Jones know explosives."

The six of them had wing suits though Angel, now in Nightwatcher mode, wished she had jetpacks or something to go with her suit. It would just be cooler that way.

"Wasn't the point Casey." Karai reminded her boyfriend. "We just need a way in." With that they headed toward the hole they had created., being blasted at all the way down.

Upon landing Bishop took out three of them back to back to back like they were nothing. Casey, Leo, Karai and Angel followed suit with a few of their own. Once that was done April asked, "Where to Bishop?"

"This way." He answered, waving his hands and running down a corridor with the others behind him.

The Kraang droids bought Leatherhead and the four turtles to Kraang Prime and Kraang Subprime's location. Kraang Prime laughed a bit while Subprime said, "Well, if isn't the turtles and that stupid alligator thing that shouts Kraang all the time."

"Welcome Earth creatures." Kraang Prime declared. "You are about to enjoy that which is known as the invasion of Earth."

"Haven't you played this song twice already?" Aaliyah asked annoyed. "And lost the tunes twice." The Kraang droid behind her poked his blaster into her side to silence her. From above Leo and the team found them just as an alarm went off.

"What now?" Kraang Subprime wondered and went to the console. "Seriously?" The screen showed the massive ship belonging to what was left of the Triceraton armada.

"The…the Triceratons?" Kraang Prime stuttered.

"Not the Triceratons." Kraang Subprime protested. "Not here, not now."

A transmission cut through everything's signal. "Greeting, sub life forms of Earth. I am Captain Mozar of the Triceraton Empire." He introduced, sounding entirely reasonable for the moment. "Let it be known your planet is infested with Kraang, and insidious alien bent on mutating Earth into their own home world. We Triceratons will eliminate these hideous aliens, freeing you of their vile plans." Everyone knew it sounded reasonable, and were waiting for the other shoe to drop. They were not disappointed. "Unfortunately, your Earth will be annihilated as well. That is all."

Splinter and Adelita watched the small TV in dojo, unamused. Adelita whispered, "Aaliyah, Angel."

"And please, have a nice day." Mozar added casually, much to the freaked out look on the face of April's father Kirby O'Neill. Not to mention most of the citizens of the world. With that the transmission ended.]

On the Technodrome Donnie gasped, "Holy chalupas, it's actually happening. Double invasion."

Then they heard, "Goongala!" As Leo, grappling hook in hand, descended with April, Casey, Jennifer and Karai by his side to kick off the five Kraang droids behind Aaliyah and the guys. Leatherhead tackled two more off the sides and he tackled Kraang Prime, for what that was worth.

Bishop landed on the small device that held Kraang Subprime. "Get off my robo back." He declared only to look up confused. "Bishop? You filthy swindling Kraang,"

From the suit Bishop looked down at him. "I am an Utrom." He declared. "Just as you once were brother. Or shall I call you sub-subprime."

"Don't call me that. You know I hate that." Kraang Subprime declared and let out a growl of annoyance and frustration.

Bishop looked up the turtles, Leatherhead and their human allies. "Go my friends. Get to the hanger." He said.

"Thanks Bishop. Let's go." Leo said before they all ran off.

"Move it guys." Donnie added.

When they reached the hanger Leo declared, "It's too late to blow this thing. Pair up and grab a ship."

Leo and Raph got one, arguing briefly over who got to fly. Mikey and Casey got one, having the same argument before Mikey won. Donnie flew the one for him and April. Jennifer and Karai got another, the kunoichi piloting as Angel deactivated her Nightwatcher armor before she and Aaliyah took a ship for themselves.

Several Triceraton vessels shot out and Leo was able to quickly determine something. "They're not just targeting the Technodrome. They're heading for the city."

Once the Triceratons realized the stealth ships were coming after them they altered course to stop the turtle piloted ships. They opened fire and Karai and Jennifer had the misfortune to be taken down immediately. They landed in the water near the Statue of Liberty, but luckily both girls were unharmed and easily able to get out. "Guess one of us should have spent more time playing video games." Karai noted dryly. "Too bad our dad's would never have gone for it."

April helped Donnie dodge, though he noted that their odds of surviving where nine hundred sixty seven to one, but they made a great team.

Thanks to Mikey's game skills he was able to shoot down two Triceraton fighters.

Aaliyah got one herself before the ship she and Angel on were shot down. They landed roughly on the ground also not far from the Statue of Liberty. "Wipe out." Angel muttered as they got out of the downed ship.

Leo hit a fighter from behind with the stealth ship and then fired on it, destroying it. Raph noticed the Technodrome also working to take down the Triceraton fighters. The sensors also caught sight of Leatherhead swimming to shore with Bishop standing on his back. "They made it, but the Technodrome is still flying." Raph said.

After some neat evasive maneuvers the ship Donnie had was hit just before destroying another fighter. As they went down April wrapped her arms around the purple masked turtle's neck to brace herself, of which he had no objection to.

The ship landed on Coney Island, skidding the roller coaster track. Bishop and Leatherhead were over to them in a moment. "My friends, are you okay?" Leatherhead asked them.

"I've always…hated…rollercoasters." April noted through the slight pain in her head.

The fighters withdrew and Mikey took a moment to celebrate. Then the Triceraton base in the sky opened up and released a blast from the bottom similar to the one from Independence Day and fired it at the Technodrome, crippling it.

It also caused Raph and Leo's ship to crash in the ocean. "Did we make it?" Leo asked.

"I think so." Raph said. He remembered what he had seen. "At least the Technodrome's down. Maybe the battle is finally over."

As they saw the Technodrome sinking again Mikey contacted Leo's T-phone. "Dude, dude. There's a ship holding some kind of energy string. It's carrying some kind of thingy." He told him.

"You're not making any sense Mikey." Leo replied but then both he and Raph saw what their younger brother was referring to.

"It looks like a weapon." Casey noted. "Ah crud guys, I think they're heading toward Washington square."

"I got this, oh yeah! turtle space ship power!" Mikey called out right before they hit a force field surrounding them. On their way down the spaceship got lodged in between two buildings, close enough that when someone almost avoided getting crushed they stood up and hit their head on the hull.

Leo activated his T-phone. "April." When she answered he said, "I need you and Leatherhead to get Splinter and the rest of the Mutanimals. Gather as many of our friends as you can. I'll text everyone a place for us to meet, cool?"

"What's the deal Leo?" Raph asked his eldest brother.

"The deal is we're going to need all the help we can get." He replied.

Leo, Aaliyah, and Bishop watched the ships land the device and several Triceraton beam down and start working on it. "Those Triceratons are scientists." Bishop revealed quietly. "Their job is to program the black hole generator."

"I was afraid you'd say that." Aaliyah remarked from in between Bishop and her blue masked boyfriend.

"Oh, right." Donnie said and looked to the equally size but better armed and more dangerous looking Triceratons approaching. "Those are the soldiers."

Beside Leo was Raph and Jennifer, on the other side of Bishop was Angel and Karai. "Okay," Leo said. "We're going to need the rest of the guys here fast."

"Are we enough for ya?" Casey asked with Mikey beside him.

"Oh, no. Look!" Donnie exclaimed as one of them activated the black hole generator as he declared, "For the Triceraton Empire."

All the lights in New York went out at once. "They're draining the city's energy supply to power up the weapon." Donnie realized.

Mikey came up behind his smartest brother. "You mean no TV? That ain't right." Mikey said.

"I think we've got bigger problems Mikey." Angel said but then thought a moment. "Though of course I was looking forward to the premieres of Vampire Diaries and The Originals this week."

"Alright team, this could be our last battle." Leo said solemnly. "Are you ready?"

With that the team started forward as stealthily as possible, trying to avoid the patrolling soldiers. This worked great until Mikey stepped on one of their tails. "Earth creatures." He bellowed and started to shoot at Mikey. The soldiers followed suit.

"Take out their weapons." Bishop told them.

"Sounds like plan." Angel declared and activated her Nightwatcher armor again. She leapt up and took a hold of one of the blasters and snapped it in half but she got punched by that Triceraton guard for her trouble. It probably would have killed her if not for the armor.

Leo and Mikey threw several shurikens that destroyed another of the blasters.

Aaliyah and Jennifer repeated the process on another one.

Casey shot cherry bomb wrapped pucks at Triceraton. He roared in annoyance and charged the masked vigilante, slamming into him. Rather by accident or design Raph broke his best friend's fall. Another one smacked Leo hard as he tried to check on his friends.

Mikey took out one and then they saw Bishop getting blasted multiple times by several Triceraton, which was enough to take out the droids ability to function. "Bishop, no!" Mikey exclaimed, not seeing the one coming up from behind him until he turned to see the laser in his face.

To be continued…


	63. Annihalation

Just as the blaster in front of Mikey was charging to be fired a shuriken flew out and destroyed the blaster. The orange masked turtle turned to see Splinter standing on top of a lamp post. "That was some good timing." Aaliyah commented; glad also to see that her older sister had the sense to not be there. She assumed she was still at the lair then.

"We heard you might need some assistance." Splinter said just as Rockwell and Usagi popped up in front of him and Pidgeon Pete and Hawlita were above him, flapping their wings.

"Splinter!" Leo exclaimed.

"And reinforcements, yeah!" Raph added happily.

A car flew in the air and crashed in front of some of the Triceratons and then Slash and Leatherhead showed up with April in between them. Next to Leatherhead was the newest member of the Mutanimals Muckman, beside him was the axolotl mutant Candy and then Mondo Gecko skated forward.

One Triceraton moved to use his own laser to try to shoot out at Angel when the blaster was chopped in half by a sword belonging to the brown fox mutant Ninjara and then he was kicked in the chest hard by the arctic fox mutant Alopex. "No way were we going to miss this." Alopex said as she looked to Angel.

"Casey!" April gasped, relieved to see him alive. Casey hugged her back as he said, "Red."

"Nice to see you're okay O'Neill." Karai said, trying to ignore the slight jealously she felt at seeing them embrace. She already knew they were close, and of course she knew the hockey masked vigilante loved her while Donnie was with April, but what the head knew and what the heart felt were sometimes different things.

"You too Karai." April replied.

It was also something Donnie could relate too. "Guys, um, you do realize that we're still in extremely horrendous trouble, right?" He asked them.

"So what do we do?" April wondered.

"We find a way to stop them." Angel said.

Mikey was in front of April now. "Kick their Jurassic." He stated, causing Angel to laugh a bit, privately impressed how the orange masked turtle was able to clean up an otherwise horrible sounding statement.

With that the team charged the Triceratons.

One Triceraton was distracted as Donnie hit him in the head with his staff and then was unprepared for Leatherhead to pounce him. Another found himself dodging one mace attack from Slash, then moved to dodge a strike from Ninjara only for the large black masked turtle to connect with him that time. "Nice shot." Ninjara said to him with a laugh.

"All in the wrists." Slash joked with her.

Despite being distracted by jumping behind a Triceraton and sweeping her legs out to trip her opponent, Alopex noticed that they still had more than enough people to be working on that mysterious object in the center that she remembered was some sort of black hole generator.

Mikey tried to attack a Triceraton and got hit. "Mikey." Leo gasped and tried to attack the Triceraton as well. He grabbed ahold of the blue masked turtle's foot and started to slam him on the ground. He was then tossed, to land on Bishop's deactivated body.

A Triceraton tried to pound his fist onto Jennifer's head, but the lithe blonde managed to dodge out of the way. She lashed out to try to kick him only for it to seem to have no effect. It wasn't quite as easy to ignore when Aaliyah smashed him in the feet with a double kick to the chest.

Pidgeon Pete tried to dive bomb a Triceraton himself but was grabbed by the neck and slammed hard onto the ground. He moved to step on the pidgeon mutant only to feel something barely slam into his back as Hawlita tried to spear him from behind to no effect. He swung and the hawk mutant dodged under him, reaching out to pull Pidgeon Pete with her.

With a, "Goongala." Casey again tried to shoot a few exploding hockey pucks at a Triceraton who turned to look at him but otherwise seemed unfazed. "Maybe I need an upgrade." The vigilante noted as he started to skate away from him. Karai jumped up and tried to attack that same Triceraton but it got a grip on her and tossed the kunoichi away as well.

April noticed as well. "Casey, Karai." She gasped and barely managed to lift one of the fallen blasters from the ground and just barely managed to get a shot off that, perhaps by luck more than anything else, struck the Triceraton in the face.

Casey and Karai were now closer to April. "Awesome save Red." Casey noted. "Thanks." Karai added.

They heard Mondo exclaim, "Cowabunga!" As he skated rapidly past multiple laser blasts and toward a Triceraton. "it's time for Mondo Gecko to open up a can of.." He started hit a Triceraton's leg and was knocked to the ground.

That one rubbed his leg and looked to see Mondo standing up. While that had happened Candy leapt out and tried to slam her fists into another Triceraton's face only to be caught and slammed down hard next to her gecko boyfriend. With that the two started to try to stamp down on the lizard mutants.

"Mondo, Candy." Muckman said. "Stay away from my pals, you alien freaks." With that a gust of wind started up, lifting up some trash. He was about to throw those when two more Triceraton's started to blast at the garbage mutant, causing him to lose his arms and his concentration. They continued to blast at him, though it was anyone's guess how effective that would truly be.

Splinter ran forward, jumped off a Triceraton's head and then used a small whip to take away lasers from two others, using those to cause the three of them to knock each other out as he landed. He noticed the commotion in the center. "We must stop the black whole weapons from being triggered." The rat master announced as Muckman reformed behind him.

"Slash, Leatherhead, take that machine down." Leo ordered the two largest and strongest members of the united team.

"Count me in too." Angel added. The Nightwatcher armor gave her a good strength boost as well.

Leatherhead roared and charged one, only to get stuck in a wrestling like match. "You two destroy the weapon." The alligator mutant stated.

Another intercepted Angel. She dodged the fist but got caught with a kick. The Triceraton grunted in surprise. "Interesting, you possess the eye of sarnath." He noted with some amusement.

"Yeah, let's see how amused you are with this." Angel retorted as her metal fist connected with his head. He stumbled back but not enough for the armored Latina girl to help. "Looks like you're on your own Slash."

The black masked turtle leapt up and brought his mace down hard on one of the Triceratons and then turned to the machine. He slammed his mace against it multiple times. "Not even a scratch." He noted irritated.

"What is that thing made out of?" Ninjara wondered.

Slash tried a different approach from what looked to be an outlet of some sort. So distracted was he that he didn't notice the Triceraton coming up from behind him. Luckily a thrown car was slammed into him and there was a screech from Rockwell as he lifted another car up. All through that Slash kept pounding, oblivious.

Rockwell grunted like a monkey would. Then he got a psychic impression. "Great scot, more are about to beam down." He announced…just as one beamed in from behind him and grabbed him by the head and tossed him. It then tossed a small pyramidal device which trapped Rockwell in a force field.

Over a dozen more beamed down. One trapped Slash in the same manner as another trapped Ninjara with the same device, causing both to lose their weapons. "Dino freaks." Slash growled.

"This battle is over, you have all lost." A Triceraton whom Jennifer was sure was none other than the leader of the invasion, Captain Mozar, stated. Leatherhead and Alopex moved in to try to attack too only to be trapped by another force field device.

"Leatherhead!" Mikey exclaimed and jumped over a Triceraton to try to help only to be grabbed by Mozar.

"Foolish little one, you are coming with me." Mozar announced. He then started to beam away with the youngest turtle.

Raph called out, "Mikey!" As Splinter called out, "Michelangelo!" Jennifer, Aaliyah and his eldest brothers looked up in shock as Mozar beamed away with Mikey, only to have more Triceratons appear on the ground.

Another thrown cube trapped Casey and as Karai and Jennifer ran over to try to free the hockey masked vigilante both girls too found herself trapped in one of the force fields.

"Casey!" April gasped as from behind her Raph gasped, "Jennifer." Both ran forward to try to help them but Leo tackled Jennifer while Angel took a hold of Raph's arm, both saying, "No." With dismay Aaliyah noted at some point Alopex and the rest of the Mutanimals had been captured as well.

"I'll come back for you." April promised Casey in unison with the promise Raph called out to Jennifer. More Triceratons teleported in and started to fire at them.

"We've got to go sensei." Leo said.

"Retreat, everyone retreat." Splinter ordered the remaining group, which he sadly noted was only his three sons, Aaliyah, April and Angel.

Standing on top of a Triceraton Donnie noted, "Huh, this little baby might come in…" But was interrupted when a beam struck him in the shoulder and he landed with an, "Ow!" He then got up and followed even as the Triceraton he had taken the device from started to stir.

The remaining team members converged on a rooftop. "We've got to back for them sensei." Leo said as he thought about the Mutanimals, Casey, Jennifer and Karai. "We can't just leave them there."

"We need to teach these horn headed jerks a lesson too while we're at it." Angel said, sounding completely pissed off despite the helmet and the voice modifier on the Nightwatcher armor.

"And what about Mikey?" Aaliyah wondered worriedly,

"What are they going to do to him on that freaky ship, probe him?" Raph questioned, also sounding worried.

"First we must destroy the black hole machine, that is the priority." Splinter reminded his students. "If we cannot stop this weapon, the entire world is doomed."

Angel sighed. "Yeah, I guess you have a point there." She conceded.

"Sensei, I think it will take some time for the Triceratons to fix all the damage Slash caused." Donnie noted reasonably though Aaliyah didn't really seem to remember Slash or any of them really causing all that much damage to the black hole machine.

"We've got to go after Mikey." Aaliyah insisted.

"Even if we stop the generator, we still have to get him back." Leo pointed out.

Splinter jumped off the water tower to land in front of his students. "Go then, save your brother." He looked to Aaliyah, "And you as well. April, Angel and I will stop the Triceratons and rescue our friends and my daughter."

"By ourselves?" April questioned in disbelief. "Uh, you're, uh, kidding, right Sensei?"

"Yeah, what could possibly go wrong there?" Angel questioned sarcastically and the red head was sure she had rolled her eyes as well though with the helmet it was hard to tell.

"We will ally ourselves with someone even more powerful than the Mighty Mutanimals." Splinter announced as he closed his eyes.

"Who sensei?" Leo wondered.

Aaliyah bit her lip as the only logical thought came to her. "You have got to be kidding me…" She murmured.

"The Shredder." Splinter stated. He heard April gasp in shock and Aaliyah sigh as if that was the same deduction the white masked female turtle had made.

It was easy to guess Angel was gaping at him even through her Nightwatcher armor. "You have got to be frickin kidding." She said.

Sirens roared as April stealthily snuck up to the entrance to the cathedral where Shredder and his minions seemed to live at. She made her way to the throne room, doing an admiral job of hiding her anxiety about this plan. There was a sound and she gasped before drawing her tessen and looking around for the source.

Then there was a laugh as an invisible force forced her tessen hand behind her back to hold her captive, April knew that had to be Anton Zeck aka Bebop.

"Hey girl, who do you think opened that door for you?" Bebop questioned as from the front Hector seemed to also materialize out of nowhere thanks to his shapeshifting powers, including the ability to blend in like a chameleon.

Hector gave April a menacing, leerful like smile that he normally reserved for Jennifer. "Maybe I should teach her not to intrude into places she doesn't belong." He stated gleefully.

Splinter jumped down from the ceiling, where he and Angel had snuck in from the roof and the broken area of glass at the top, and smacked the mutant warthog in the head with his staff. Angel meanwhile jumped down and slammed her metal plated feet right into Hector's face. "I don't think so, you little bastard." She bit off.

"Bad move rat." Tiger Claw said as he stepped forward. "Are you desperate?" The mutant tiger wondered as he withdrew one of his blasters and pointed it at the two girls and Splinter. "Or just fools?" He then fired the ice laser at them. All three of them dodged out of the way.

"We're not here to…oh." April started but then ran her back up against the large form of Ivan Steranko aka Rocksteady.

"Hah, is Rocksteady late for party time?" The giant rhino mutant asked. He moved to grab April but the red head moved out of the way and dashed around him. He tried to gore her and she dodged again, and another maneuver was dodged as well.

Tiger Claw laughed as he shot at Splinter. "We have not come to fight you." Splinter stated, trying to finish where April had been cut off.

"Too bad for you." Hector said as he wiped a bit of blood from his nose, then formed the typical mantis scythe arms as he tried to chop Angel into three parts. "Because that's what you're going to get."

Angel used her hands, covered in the armor, to block both scythe attacks. "As much as I'd love to kick your misogynistic ass right now, we have other problems to worry about." She shot back angrily.

Tiger Claw tried to attack Splinter, but the rat master moved out of the way and then kicked him. They started to wrestle against each other. "Foolish move, bringing a couple of cubs here." The tiger mutant said to Splinter.

April was dodging strike after strike from the giant rhino mutant. Then she realized that her ankle was grabbed by the Bebop, who still lay on the ground. He laughed and the distraction allowed Rocksteady to get his massive right hand around her. "Help." April called.

"April, shoot." Angel forced the scythes away and was going to turn to help her. She didn't pay attention to the wings that Hector grew from his back which he used to bring down on top of her head. That was one instance where having metal around the head didn't work out quiet as well as one would hope for.

Splinter pushed Tiger Claw away and called out, "April." In alarm, only to have one of the laser guns pointed at his head. He was about to fire when a deep male voice ordered, "Stop."

From behind Splinter stood his former friend and oldest nemesis; Oroku Saki aka the Shredder. "I wish to know why Hamato Yoshi has come here." He said. Angel wished she was in the position to tell this bladed maniac where he could stick those wishes. "Perhaps to end his miserable existence." He added as he extracted the blades on his right arm.

"Our feud is meaningless in the face of this invasions Saki." Splinter reasoned, though he did not turn to face Shredder. "The world will soon be destroyed." The rat master continued and Angel noticed a Triceraton ship flying in the background as if that were helping to prove his point. "Will you sit by and watch? Or will you help us save it?"

"Helping would be a first for you." Angel noted darkly only to get growled at by Hector, though she ignored him.

Shredder pointed his blade at Splinter's throat. "What have you done with Karai?" He demanded to know.

"She's being held by the same horned morons who are attacking this city right now." Angel answered him simply though April was sure she was glaring at the Shredder.

"That is correct, she has been captured by the Triceratons." Splinter confirmed.

Shredder extracted his other blades. "You lie." He stated.

"They're telling the truth Shredder." April voiced now, where she was being held by Rocksteady with her arms behind her back. "Karai is still out there. If the Earth blows up you'll never see her again. So maybe you can do the right thing for once in your evil life," Angel had to chuckle a bit despite the circumstances as that comment mimicked her own o only moments ago. "Even be a hero for a change. That is, if you still love Karai."

Shredder huffed and glared angrily between April, Angel and Splinter but made his choice…

Meanwhile the turtles found what they were looking for. "There's Mikey's ship." Leo said. "Told you it came down this way."

"Wow, not a bad park job either." Donnie noted.

"At least considering it's stuck between two buildings." Aaliyah added, trying to be humorous but as far as she was concerned failing kind of miserably. Two humans peeked up from the car they were behind to see them. They screamed and that caused the four turtles to scream back in shock.

"Aliens, run." One of them stated just before they both ran.

"Uh, humans are so annoying sometimes." Raph said dryly before remembering that the female turtle with them used to be one, to say nothing about his girlfriend, best friend or any other human they knew. "No offense."

Aaliyah shrugged it off. "None taken. You'd be surprised how often humans think that of other humans." She noted matter of factly. They got up and followed Leo and Donnie toward the Kraang ship.

They boarded and got ready to fly. "The mothership is approximately one hundred thousand miles from Earth." Donnie stated, making Aaliyah wonder if the purple masked turtle had some kind of coordinates she couldn't see or if he was just that smart. "Roughly half the distance from the Earth to the moon."

"Alright, think I've got the hang of this." Leo said.

"Just like Space Heroes." Aaliyah said with a cute smile that Leo briefly returned. That was why as the ship tried to scrape its way up the buildings and out it suddenly lost control and crashed to the ground. It was rolling around a bit and as Raph and Donnie glared up at them Leo laughed kind of forcefully to dissipate the atmosphere now. Then he righted the ship and they took off.

"Turtles were definitely not meant to go to space." Raph noted as he looked sort of greener than usual. He then proceeded to lose what was left of his last meal, making Aaliyah unconsciously grimace.

Donnie floated back to the console. "Hold on, let me turn on the artificial gravity." He said. A moment later he did and then his oldest brothers and Aaliyah fell to the floor hard. Donnie started to laugh until Raph's last meal landed on his head now.

As Donnie went about brushing his head off and muttering in disgust the two turtles stood up. " Guys, I see it." Leo said. "The mothership."

"Oh my gosh." Aaliyah got out, shocked at it.

"Kay, but where' s Mikey?" Raph wondered.

"I'm detecting a unique life signature coming from the closest craft." Donnie answered. Aaliyah again wondered how he made sense of the readings. "It's got to be him." Then he switched gears. "Check it out, I think I finally figured out the cloak on this baby."

"This thing has a cloak?" Aaliyah asked, surprised. She had not been around when the first ship had shown up after all.

"They'll never find us now." Donnie said with a smile at Aaliyah and his brothers. They saw several fighters deploy from the mothership. "Okay, this is disturbing." The purple masked turtle noted.

"Aw, don't make me throw up again." Raph said.

"The Triceratons are locking onto us with their weapons." Donnie said.

"Even though we're cloaked?" Aaliyah asked, suddenly suspecting the Triceratons knew how to read past their longtime enemies' defenses.

"Floor it Leo, go go!" Donnie said even as the blue masked turtle did just that. They barely avoided the initial barrage but were moving back for another strike.

"How can they us Donnie?" Leo asked.

"Let me text them and find out." Donnie replied sarcastically and then burst out with, "I have no idea."

"Their sensors must be set up to see past Kraang cloaks." Aaliyah surmised.

Donnie nodded. "Of course." He admitted with a sigh. "Their sensors are probably calibrated for it otherwise they could be wiped out be a fleet of cloaked Kraang ships."

At Leo's orders Raph manned the weapons station but the Triceraton's were dodging and Aaliyah suspected the red masked turtle's seemingly random console pounding was not helping the situation either.

One of the craft struck the Kraang ship and Raph growled annoyed. With a roar of sorts they ran headlong into the ship that struck the Kraang vessel. It wrapped its metal tentacles around the craft and somehow as Raph was punching the console the same thing was happening on the outside. Then finally it was blasted and destroyed that vessel.

"One down, hundreds to go." Aaliyah said even as they were hit again.

"Look out Leo, left, left." Raph tried to direct. "Would you let me drive?" He finally asked in exasperation.

"There's just too many of them captain." Donnie said, trying to give his best Space Heroes impression.

With a look of determination Leo headed toward the mothership. All four became kind of nervous as the mothership rotated around and pointed the edge of it at them, where the edge started to glow and collect energy. It reminded Aaliyah of the movie Independence Day and that was not reassuring considering what happened with that, Sure enough it fired and struck the Kraang ship, blowing it up…but not before Donnie leapt , grabbed Raph and Leo, making sure the blue masked turtle had a hold of Aaliyah as well, and activated the device he had grabbed from the downed Triceraton from the last disastrous battle earlier and pressed the button.

That transported them onto the mothership. "We're alive." Leo exclaimed surprised and joyful.

"You snagged a teleporter?" Raph asked Donnie. "You mean we could have just beamed here?" He demanded, getting kind of angry.

"There was only one charge and I…" Donnie started to explain but some noises made him stop. "Oh man, we're in trouble." Surrounding them were several Triceratons with lases pointed at them.

"Not a good set of coordinates Donnie." Aaliyah sighed. The Mozar approached them with a growl. He then held up Mikey.

"Guys, that was awesome." He exclaimed. "Thanks for the sweet rescue. So who's going to rescue us next? April? Casey? Angel?"

Donnie nervously tried to laugh.

Bebop's ridiculous dance was just a distraction to allow Rocksteady and Angel to knock a Triceraton off the roof on their way back the Washington Square. That drew the attention of one on the ground. Splinter jumped off its head and Shredder took out its laser by chopping the top up. He then beat down the Triceraton.

"This is so weird." Angel noted dryly.

"We agree on one thing, tin can man." Hector said from behind her and Rocksteady though this proved to Angel that he didn't realize the person behind the armor was in fact a teenage girl…and immediately decided it was probably better that way.

"We must remain stealthy." Splinter said. Shredder ran off, as did Splinter. Behind them were April, Angel, Fishface aka Xever Montes, Rahzar aka Chris Bradford, Tiger Claw, Hector, Bebop and Rocksteady.

They hid behind a truck and April noticed something. "Whatever we do, we better do it fast." She noted with Rahzar behind her as a Triceraton powered up the black hole generator.

"The timer has been repaired." One of them said. "This planet has meer nextons to live." Angel assumed it was some Triceraton version of minutes.

"We must not waste time master." Tiger Claw said to Shredder. "We must…oh no." He was interrupted as another set of teleporters went off and more Triceratons appeared. Two of them even fist bumped, which would have amused Angel in different circumstances.

The five turtles were placed on their knees in front of Mozar. "Captain Mozar, please don't destroy the Earth." Donnie pleaded. "Our world has so much potential."

"The humans of your world are as thoughtless as the Kraang." Mozar countered. "They pollute the planet, erode its ozone willingly, and they don't even need mutagen to do it."

"That's no excuse for mass extinction." Aaliyah replied hotly.

He ignored the female turtle. "Escort them to the airlock and be done with them." He ordered. A Triceraton grabbed Mikey while another grabbed Raph.

Both stop when Leo spoke up. "You can destroy us Mozar, that's okay." He started as looked at the ground.

"It is?" Mikey questioned.

Leo ignored his youngest brother. "But I'm asking you one last time before I take this whole ship down." Now Leo looked up to glare at the Triceraton captain. "Let the Earth survive. Or be destroyed."

Aaliyah had to give him credit for good speeches and good intentions but she wasn't sure how he would follow up on that.

"Empty threats." Mozar said.

A Triceraton reached for Leo. The blue masked turtle grabbed his large thumb and flipped onto his feet. He took the power cell from the laser and despite Mozar's order…or perhaps plea, Aaliyah thought it was a combination of both, he threw the part toward the dome. It took out a section of the screen.

A few Triceraton met what Aaliyah could only assume was a horrible end in the vacuum of space. She hoped they weren't going to follow stead. Leo grabbed a console, Donnie grabbed his foot, Raph grabbed his foot, Aaliyah grabbed his foot and Mikey grabbed her foot.

One Triceraton grabbed a hold of Mikey and he lost his grip on Aaliyah's foot. Mikey started to scream. He was up against the ruptured dome now.

"Mikey." Raph called out.

"The grappling hook." Aaliyah started.

The red masked turtle nodded. "Already on it." He promised as he shot it toward his younger brother.

Mikey caught it, took a device off his captor's belt and then moved as another Triceraton slammed into the one that had been holding him. "Guys, check it out." Mikey said and pressed the button, staring with; "Booyakas…" Before they teleported.

The five turtles landed hard in New York. They started to stand only to get blasted at inadvertently from the fight going on.

Rocksteady was locked horn to horn with a Triceraton, followed by the kind of fisticuffs one would expect from WWE matches.

"April." Slash and Karai said as Casey said, "Red." When they noticed her running toward them.

"Angel." Jennifer said happily as she saw the armored vigilante coming toward her and the two fox girls.

"I knew you wouldn't leave us behind." Casey added.

"I'll get you guys out in no time." April said as she leaned down toward the pyramidal device. She tried to smash it but to no avail. Angel had better luck smashing the one holding Jennifer but of course she had the suit's metal and strength to back up her move. A moment later though April succeeded in her attempt too.

Both Casey and Jennifer hit the ground a bit hard, but none the worse for wear. "Thanks April, you rule." Casey said.

"Thank you so much." Jennifer said as she picked up her batons. "Now let's help the others out."

"Incoming Triceraton." Candy noted.

"There's no time." Rockwell said.

"Just go guys." Slash said to the four humans.

As the Triceraton was about to attack them Tiger Claw used his ice blaster to shoot laser tip, arm and center of forehead. "Quickly, run." He instructed the four humans.

"You're going to have to tell me how this happened." Jennifer said to her two friends.

Shredder and Splinter took out a Triceraton even as they both heard Karai gasp, "Father." Each man assumed she had to be talking about themselves though of course she was talking about Splinter. That didn't stop her from being shocked to see Shredder working with them.

Splinter used powder to knock out another Triceraton but the large arm fell on him in the process. As he rose he said, "Hurry, Saki. We have no time."

Jennifer glanced back, barely making out the dimming counter. She made out Splinter getting up and Shredder turning to look as well. Then the blonde had a very horrible feeling in her stomach, as if she had the flu or food poisoning, but this had nothing to do with a virus. "No, wait." She started.

It didn't matter. Splinter ran toward the black hole machine with Shredder behind him. He was just about to reach the timer when he suddenly straightened and gasped even as Jennifer let out a cry of terror.

The five turtles turned. April, Casey and Angel turned. They all saw the same horrendous sight. Though from their vantage point they couldn't see it; they could all imagine it even from that back. The view of the blade's from Shredder's left arm protruding from Splinter's chest. He then pulled the blades out and allowed Splinter's body to fall to the ground.

"NO!" All four turtles yelled.

"Father!" Karai exclaimed as she felt the tears in her eyes. At that moment she wished for nothing more than to be free, to be at her father's side for as long as she could. Then to turn her rage onto Shredder.

"Master Splinter!" Aaliyah gasped, tears already in her eyes.

Though it was unseen from the helmet Angel felt tears brimming her eyes. "You son of a bitch!" She screamed as she started toward Shredder.

For just a moment April and Casey stood in shock too before April placed her hands against her head. He also noticed Jennifer do the same thing. Both girls let out a yell of…something. Grief, or maybe anger…maybe even both. Two psychic blasts emanated and Shredder away from Splinter's still form.

Splinter had heard all of their cries of anguish. He heard the timer of the machine go off. Then everything went black.

The black hole machine beeped and started to rise. The Triceratons teleported away as the generator activated.

Angel briefly saw Rocksteady and Bebop hugging each other. "Hold me close comrade Zeck…" He started before they were sucked up. Fishface and Rahzar quickly followed.

Clinging one handed to a tree Tiger Claw demanded, "Shredder! What have you done!?" He was almost positive this could have been stopped had Shredder not stabbed Splinter in the back instead.

"Hamato Yoshi is finished." The now helmetless Shredder declared as he stared at the ground, then back up at Tiger Claw. "The Earth can be destroyed for all I care. I have finally won!" He exclaimed as he pumped his fist in what most would consider a pyrrhic victory.

Everyone who was able gathered around Splinter's body. They all knew and wished Karai could be there too. Leo lifted Splinter's head to lie it on his lap. Mikey leaned down to hug him as Jennifer leaned down to kiss Splinter on the cheek, her tears flowing down her face to be joined by Mikey's tears.

The artificial black hole expanded. It continued to consume. It stole Splinter's body. It stole the Mutanimals, as well as Ninjara and Alopex. It stole Karai.

Aaliyah cried, not only for Splinter; who had become her teacher but she cried for Adelita who she figured had to be alone and worried, not realizing that the world was ending. She cried because after so many years of a fractured relationship with her older sister that chance to repair it had been stolen from her.

The seemingly from the center of the black hole a white ship descended. A platform fell and the door opened to reveal a white looking robot. "Hurry! We haven't much time!" He called out.

"Do we trust him?" Donnie asked.

"Do we have a choice?" April countered as she started the ship, her hands in her face to help block the wind. The tears in her eyes didn't help her vision either. They all boarded the ship as New York was torn apart. The ship barely escaped the gravity pull of the black hole as the world was being pulled in.

"Everyone hold on." The strange robot told them. The ship accelerated just as the Earth was pulled into the black hole and it vanished. The shockwave hit the ship but didn't seem to harm it.

"Did that just happen?" April asked as she thought of her dad, as she thought of the possibility that her mom could have been alive up until that point.

"I think so." Jennifer said softly as she still cried. Only now did she understand why May had chosen to leave the Earth for parts unknown. Why Null and his group, including seemingly her own father, had chosen to go to Hell (literally). Somehow they had known.

Leo stared at a screen. "The Earth. Splinter. Karai. Everyone." He lamtented. "Everything."

"Gone." Donnie said softly. "Lost forever in an infinite gravitational singularity." Raph just stood by in shock, one hand on his head with his free arm absentmindedly wrapped around his Jennifer's still quietly crying form.

"Holy pepperoni." Mikey said softly.

"Watching your entire world disappear into the quantam singularity of a black hole is rather distressing." The robot noted, far too nonchalantly for Angel and Aaliyah's tastes. "Can I offer you some hot cocoa?" He asked Mikey, and the orange masked turtle took it.

"Come again?" Angel demanded angrily but Aaliyah placed her had on the girl's arm.

"Dude, who are you?" Mikey asked him.

"My name is Professor Zayton Honeycutt." The robot introduced himself. "And you my friends, are about to embark on a wondrous adventure." Everyone did look at each other, kind of intrigued. Each wondered if this adventure could lead them to a way to bring the Earth and Splinter back.

And from the darkness that seemed to engulf her for a moment there came a bright white light…

Left out Casey saying it was awesome. Seemed out of character as on top of everything he had lost his dad, sister and in this world his girlfriend. Is there a way to reverse what has been done? How can the team come to terms with those they've lost? What became of Renet? How many are even really lost? The adventure continues…in space.


End file.
